The Journey Continues

Students study various subjects and acquire skills to gather and analyze information in college. In the Senior Capstone course, these students engage in a culminating experience by writing a journal article for competitive review.

Through writing a research paper, students have a chance to apply their learning, collect information and data and interpret findings based on the theories they have learned. Rather than just reciting established theories and facts, they explore and acquire new data and test them against theories. This kind of knowledge production will be a great asset to students living in a rapidly changing environment, where new ideas and solutions are continuously demanded.

While employing different methods and managing data, many students discover the complexity of working on a project where a straightforward blueprint simply does not exist. They notice that even though they may have come to one conclusion, a completely different outcome could have been possible with a different method or set of data.

Students often struggle in doing research because they must seamlessly integrate all aspects of their research, a daunting job for students who have not done assignments of this complexity.

The law of gravity dawned on Isaac Newton when an apple fell on his head. Many of the manuscript authors in this issue must have also experienced this magical moment when all pieces in their manuscript suddenly crystallized after their strenuous effort to understand data and put an accurate interpretation on their data.

Although the topics of papers varied, the most popular topic related to social media, such as Facebook, Twitter and blogs. Wayne Gretzky once said something like a great hockey player will skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been. I am glad that our students recognized the importance of emerging social network sites and tackled this pertinent related issue that is not fully understood even by academics today.

Dr. Don Grady was responsible for overseeing the review process. Without his help, this edition of the Elon Journal would not have been possible.