The senior thesis is emblematic of the kind of intellectual freedom Bard College at Simon’s Rock’s Upper College students are given. It is a year-long, self-designed scholarly project that is the capstone of a student’s work. It’s required of everyone. The thesis is not just an academic requirement for a Simon’s Rock Bachelor of Arts degree, it is work that adds to the world’s storehouse of knowledge.
At the beginning of the thesis project, a formal proposal must be submitted and approved. This collection includes senior thesis proposals beginning in academic year 1998-1999 as well as theses beginning in 2011.
2016
Senior Thesis Proposal, Bryce Parker
Senior Thesis Proposal, Grant Parker
The Knit Wits: Creating a Cam and Linear Actuator Driven Knitting Machine, Megan Patoskie
African American Women in the Civil Rights and Black Power Movements, Queen-Ama Phillips
Senior Thesis Proposal, Vijay Pillai
Beyond the Blurred Lines of the Borderlands: Exploring Identity and Displacement of Ethnic Khmers in South Vietnam, Naomi Pitman
The Stories We Tell: Reading, Writing, and Imagining Black Women, Brianna Pope
Senior Thesis Proposal, Anna Poplawski
In The Sunlit Prison of Heaven: Salvation, Statehood, and the Religious Politics of Emancipation, Cameron Powell
One Question, Two Approaches; An Examination of the Role of Myosin 1e on Focal Adhesion Dynamics in Podocytes, Maria Presti
The Application of Mathematical and Theoretical Methods to the Chinese Housing Market: A Case Study, Mallie Prytherch
Senior Thesis Proposal, Dominica Purcell
A Custom Built Hexapod Spider Robot: The Design, Fabrication, and Control Processes, Vasu Rabaib
Rewriting the Story: Neither Here, Nor There, Katharine Reid
Senior Thesis Proposal, A.J. Rio-Glick
Unanswerable Questions: What is a Director and How Does One Direct?, Seth Roseman
Mark My Words: Exploring the Power of Spoken Word Poetry, Grace Rossman
Two Accounts of History A Phylogenetic Approach to Reconstructing Gene Trees and Species Trees or Ninety-Five Theses on Species A Tree-tise, Nathan Sadowsky
Senior Thesis Proposal, Andre Santana
Lesbian Mothers Don't Get Divorced: Exploring Kin Without Commiseration, Irene Shamas
On Groups and Their Graphs, Melissa Sherman-Bennett
A Conchologist’s First Book: The Systematics, Ecology, and Distribution of the Non-Marine Mollusks of Montserrat, Lesser Antilles, Nathaniel Shoobs
Senior Thesis Proposal, Ihor Shuhan
The Young Lords Party & Puerto Rican Traditions of Anti-colonial Resistance, Cori Stenning-Barnes
Polymer Nanocomposites and Understanding Their Rheological Behavior, Koshu Takatsuji
Bhutan’s youth struggle in Kingdom of Happiness, Riksel Tshering
Bhutan Traditions in the Three Worlds, Sonam Wangmo
World of Conquest: Race and Violence in a Virtual Realm, Sierra Warren
Protective Factors and Resiliency: The Ability to Bounce Back, Soraya Weill
The Art of Exploding Kittens Artificial Intelligence in Gaming and the Process of Making a Video Game, Aaron Weiss
No Such Thing as a One Man Show - A Theater Exploration of Solitary Ordeals, Naida West
Senior Thesis Proposal, Erin Wilkerson
Occasionalism: A Brief History and Analysis, Gavin Young
Senior Thesis Proposal, Hyojun James Yu
Ōmagatoki -逢魔時, the Hour of Twilight and Spirits: A Collection of Short Stories Based on and Inspired by Japanese Folktales and the Supernatural, Dawson Zimmermann
2015
Senior Thesis Proposal, Ethan Ackelsberg
Senior Thesis Proposal, Eliana Actor-Engel
Senior Thesis Proposal, Kathleen Ansel
Agency within Authenticity, or How I Finally Found(ed) My Self, Zara Anwarzai
Senior Thesis Proposal, Carrie Basch
Senior Thesis Proposal, Natalie Becker
Vers(us) Translation: Emmanuel Dongala’s Jazz and Palm Wine, Marisa Benitez
Senior Thesis Proposal, Adam Bigelow
Senior Thesis Proposal, Kori Brierley-Bowers
Senior Thesis Proposal, Caitlin Chai
Senior Thesis Proposal, Nikola Cooper-Fateyev
Senior Thesis Proposal, Marjorie Cort
Senior Thesis Proposal, Kate Decker
To be Black and Female in a White Society, Demitria DeRiggs
Senior Thesis Proposal, Cian Doyle
Gimballed Spherical Protection of a Quadcopter, Erik Elbieh
States of Refuge: Moving Bodies & Emerging Politics, Colin Eubank
Senior Thesis Proposal, Greig Fields
City.Text., Isabel Filkins
Luxuriant Withholding: Blackness and Concept in the Event of Charles Gaines, Ciaran Finlayson
Senior Thesis Proposal, Theodor Gabriel
Well-Oiled Machine in the Next Town Over (+ Other Organized Sounds), Julian Garcia-Kwan
The Role of Language in Developing Environmental Relationships & Intimate Landscapes: A Photographic Study of Environmental Relationships, Isabella Goldman
Software Entrepreneurship in Healthcare: An Experience in Software Conception and Implementation, Harrison Gregg
“TRAP SNAKE”, Lee Hayes
"I Am Obstinate...I Disappear": Toward a Communism of Reading A Lacanian Thesis, Izaak Hecht
Senior Thesis Proposal, Rory Qianqing Huang
Senior Thesis Proposal, Shannon Igo
Senior Thesis Proposal, Greg Inamine
I Am My Father's Son: A Journey in Life, Love, and Liberations, Jacob Ireland
Senior Thesis Proposal, Jo-Ellen Jeffries
Reimagining the Home[made], Amanda Johnston
Senior Thesis Proposal, Jan Jurchak
The American Food System: We The People -- Why We Eat What We Eat, Jessica Kaller
Senior Thesis Proposal, Wes Elliot Kang
BiMusicality: How to Eat Your Cake and Still Have It!, Jake Larcqua
Senior Thesis Proposal, Eldred Lee
Saximus: The Saxophone Playing Robot, Giancarlo Lezama
Senior Thesis Proposal, Cindy Zhaoran Li
An Analysis of Gravity’s Rainbow: On the Radical Politics of the Historical Novel, Cary Long
Theoretical and Kinetic Analysis of Nitrification and Reactor Design in the Scope of Lab Scale Wastewater Treatment, Alessandra Martinelli
Senior Thesis Proposal, Mia McGiffert
Senior Thesis Proposal, Jade Mermini
Senior Thesis Proposal, Matthew Meyer
Prosperous Piracy: Contemporary Maritime Economics and Politics in Two Case Studies, Alexander Morrow
Conserving the State: Postcolonial Nigeria's Gender Troubles, Victoria Ogundipe
Amour oiseau d’étoile: Messiaen’s Divine Surrealism, Sam Paris
Senior Thesis Proposal, Megan Patoski
Senior Thesis Proposal, Queen-Ama Phillips
From Pacific Ocean to Plastic Sea: Political Ecology of the Pacific Garbage Patch, Arden Pickoff-Rafferty
Intervals of Inspiration: A Creative Process in Vision and Sound, Alexander Pitman
Senior Thesis Proposal, Naomi Pitman
Senior Thesis Proposal, Brianna Pope
Senior Thesis Proposal, Cameron Powell
Senior Thesis Proposal, Maria Presti
Senior Thesis Proposal, Mallie Prytherch
Senior Thesis Proposal, Vasu Rabaib
Senior Thesis Proposal, Sofia Rafikova
Senior Thesis Proposal, Katharine Reid
Senior Thesis Proposal, Seth Roseman
Senior Thesis Proposal, Grace Rossman
Burning Nova One Town, Two Adaptations, Kahlia Russell-Self
Senior Thesis Proposal, Nathan Sadowsky
New Perspectives on Interactivity, Aaron Santiago
Senior Thesis Proposal, Irene Shamas