The Senior Thesis is an interdisciplinary, multimedia research project designed to be the culminating experience of four years of English instruction at Foxcroft. It tests all the skills and abilities students have developed in the areas of expository writing, literary analysis, inductive research, and public speaking. In addition, the Senior Thesis helps students discover and explore intellectual connections among a variety of disciplines, and learn to present to their teacher and peers, orally and in writing, the results of an extensive investigation of an area of interest to them.
For the duration of the Thesis research (the full Spring semester), an independent study schedule is negotiated between student and teacher and takes the place of regularly scheduled English classes. Beginning with five or six weeks of specific mini-research projects that allow each student to build her bibliography and consider her thesis from many angles, the project culminates in the spring as each student then makes a multimedia presentation to argue her thesis in front of peers and faculty. Each thesis is bound and becomes a part of the library's permanent collection.
Recent Senior These topics include:
Hitler's use of propaganda to sway a struggling nation and stay in power as a dictator
The daily lives of people on the autism spectrum and how they learn to cope in today’s neurotypical world
The evolution of the American Dream, the ideals behind it, and its trajectory for the future
The notion of artistic feeling of human longing and how it relates to the temptation of everyday life