What is "Capstone"?

danfif · Apr 25, 2006

Bell,

The word "capstone" it's self mean "the high point" or "crownig achivement". As far as other meanings, there are a number of companies that carry that name.

Peace Out,

Dan

firstaiddave907 · Apr 25, 2006

i think it is kinda like a portfolio of all your work you haver done i think it could be a another name for a portfolio but i could be wrong.

shock-me-sane · Apr 25, 2006

at my school it is part of the general ed requirements to get your bachelors. we have to take a "Capstone" class in different areas (humanities etc). It is just a group of specific upper division classes you have to take at the california state universities

jgwe4e · Apr 25, 2006

At my school it was a final senior project. It was quite involved, research based, and was supposed to address an issue on the nursing unit where we did our final leadership rotation.

daisybaby, LPN · Apr 25, 2006

At my school, 'capstone' was a synonym for a 7-credit course taken during the final semester of the BSN program, usually a total courseload of 13-15 credits. In addition to 7 classroom and discussion hours per week, I spent 240 clinical hours over about 10 weeks working with a single preceptor in an L&D unit at one hospital (if your GPA was 3.0 or above, you could choose your area of learning- under 3.0, you got stuck with Med-Surg no matter what). I kept weekly(graded) journals, wrote weekly case studies, gave inservices to the staff in our units, wrote a 30-page paper on evidence-based research in my specialty, and gave a solo hour-long presentation of my research. It was a real----- well, it sure was difficult.

And believe me, getting through that semester was indeed my 'crowning achievement' to date. Not sure if I could do it again.

Bird2 · Apr 25, 2006

In the ADN program that I completed the Capstone was the last week of school. We chose an area of nursing that we were interested in and then found a preceptor that agreed to work with us in that area. We then worked side by side with that one nurse for a 40 hour week to "see" what that field was like. If they worked midnights then we did also. If they wore professional clothes so did we. The Nursing instructor was available by phone if we needed her. We updated the instructor via e-mail every day. It was the finale of our program. Some of the areas that students worked were Hospice, Wound Care, ICU, Management, ER, etc.. It was the best part of the entire program.

Tweety, BSN, RN · Apr 25, 2006

The capstone in my RN to BSN program was changed to "Senior Project". It's a semester long "project" and paper. It's the very last course. 3 hours credit.

bell47 · Apr 25, 2006

Thanks everybody!bell47

Rohan · Apr 25, 2006

How funny...someone just said something about this to me today and I was clueless. He said it is the 80 hours we spend in LPN school following around preceptors.

Faeriewand, ASN, RN · Apr 27, 2006

In the ADN program that I completed the Capstone was the last week of school. We chose an area of nursing that we were interested in and then found a preceptor that agreed to work with us in that area. We then worked side by side with that one nurse for a 40 hour week to "see" what that field was like. If they worked midnights then we did also. If they wore professional clothes so did we. The Nursing instructor was available by phone if we needed her. We updated the instructor via e-mail every day. It was the finale of our program. Some of the areas that students worked were Hospice, Wound Care, ICU, Management, ER, etc.. It was the best part of the entire program.

This sounds like the best "capstone" so far. Maximized learning and real world experience! That beats a research paper any day! Too bad not all professors can't do it this way.