The Capstone Challenge - Re-designing Graduation Projects that Balance Student Employability with Academic Quality

Challenges and motivation of this project

The assessment at the exit level of a program aims to offer students opportunities to link theory and practice, integrating knowledge, skills, and attitudes to independently work on a complex assignment. This exit-level assessment is intended to evaluate the highest levels of all or most of the program learning outcomes (e.g., synthesis, integration). At Tilburg University, the primary assessment type at the exit level is a thesis, with a major focus on research skills. A thesis requires students to synthesize theoretical concepts, review published studies, understand methodologies, choose and apply suitable research methods, perform analyses to make informed decisions, and discuss and draw conclusions on findings. Unlike regular courses, students usually receive individual or small group supervision when working on theses.

Although a thesis has the above-mentioned pedagogical values, there is pressure on universities to reconsider the continuity of a thesis as a capstone project due to the following challenges observed from both practice and literature:

(C1) It is not clear to what extent a thesis contributes to performance of graduates in their subsequent study and future professional career.

(C2) It does not directly meet the needs of students in developing their employability.

(C3) Supervising diverse students is difficult, especially when supervisors do not receive sufficient support or didactic training. In fact, supervision pedagogy is not well established for bachelor and master theses, compared to PhDs (Feather et al., 2014).

(C4) Students are neither well equipped with sufficient skills nor developed with certain attitudes in their earlier program curriculum to write a thesis (Todd * et al., 2004).

(C5) It is expensive to offer individual or small group supervision, especially for large-scale study programs (Todd * et al., 2004).

(C6) Artificial Intelligence (AI) allows students to get help without detection, making it more challenging for thesis examiners to identify academic misconduct (Kenwright, 2024).

These challenges motivate us to seek interventions to improve the current thesis design and explore and pilot alternatives to thesis assessment for the long term. We aim to approach this from a multidisciplinary perspective. Therefore, TiSEM and TSHD collaborate on this project.

Objectives

With the additional capacity funded by this grant, this project aims to:

(O1) Inventory interventions to improve the current thesis design (e.g., setup/modularization, interactive didactic forms and engaging instructional activities, formative and summative assessment and feedback).

(O2) Inventory alternatives to thesis assessment from other Dutch and international universities (e.g., portfolio or performance assessment, capstone projects, internships).

(O3) Determine the most suitable interventions and alternatives based on Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis (MCDA).

(O4) Design and pilot the selected intervention and alternative in one bachelor’s (TiSEM) and one master’s program (TSHD).

Significance
Innovation

This project challenges the notion that a thesis is compulsory and the only assessment method at the exit level. It opens a crucial discussion: Why theses? Is a thesis the most appropriate assessment method for achieving the desired learning outcomes and enhancing employability?

Impact on student learning outcomes

By improving the current thesis design, this project is likely to structurally scaffold and engage students in critical thinking skills and dispositions required to fulfill the high cognitive and affective demands imposed by a thesis.

By offering an alternative, this project has the potential to integrate theory and practice in a more meaningful way so that students have sufficient possibilities to demonstrate their mastery of all or most of the program learning outcomes.

Expected outcomes

A detailed plan on an alternative for the thesis as a capstone project of a program that meets demands from stakeholders like students (employability), future employers, and university (quality standards).

Innovation across multiple schools

The multidisciplinary collaboration between TSHD and TiSEM has the potential to exchange findings on discipline-specific interventions and create a mixed intervention. For example, TiSEM is likely to contribute by identifying interventions that solve complex logistics issues, while DSS may utilize digital tools for collaboration and version control to more closely monitor student progress.