Senior Project

A senior project is required for the major. It is typically a paper of about 15 pages in length. It can be thought of as similar to the sort of paper you would write for a 4xxx or 5xxx course for which you write a term paper. One credit of Phil 4995 must be taken to represent the work on the senior project. (Senior Project Guidelines: pdf)

What you need to get started...

Find a faculty supervisor. Your faculty supervisor is usually someone with whom you have taken a class. Contact the Director of Undergraduate Studies for help if you are having trouble finding someone to supervise your senior project.
Pick up a Senior Project Proposal Form from the main office, 831 Heller Hall.
Fill out the form, after consultation with your faculty supervisor (see "Generating a topic" below). You should aim to complete and submit the form at least 15 weeks before you plan to turn in the completed project.
Ask your supervisor to sign the form.
Take the form to Judy Grandbois in the main office. She will give you a permission number for PHIL4995.
Use that number to register for PHIL4995. You MUST register A-F!
You’re ready to go!

Generating a topic

If you have a paper that you wrote for an already completed 4xxx or 5xxx course, you may wish to revise and improve that paper and use it for your senior paper. You may wish to consult the instructor for whom you wrote the paper about how to improve it, or you may ask some other faculty member to supervise your revision of it. (See below on the role of the faculty supervisor of your paper.)
If you are about to take a course in which a certain topic that interests you is to be discussed, you may wish to write your senior paper on that topic. If you get the instructor's agreement about what extra work will be involved, you may be able to write the paper both as a senior paper and as a paper for your course requirements. Some instructors will adjust the course requirements for senior-paper writers. For example, Prof. Waters will sometimes allow students to replace the final exam of a course by a draft of a senior paper, which he will read during finals week and return quickly, so that the final draft can be turned in by the beginning of the next semester.
If you have taken a course in which a certain topic interested you which you did not have time during the course to explore, you may wish to choose that topic and perhaps work on it with the guidance of the course instructor.

You need to ask and get the agreement of the faculty member to be your supervisor well in advance of—say 15 weeks before—producing your paper. Since the faculty member has to supply some guidance during the writing of the paper and has finally to read and evaluate the finished product, you will need to find a supervisor whose interests and competence include the topic you wish to write on. You may find that you need some time to make adjustments in what you wish to work on so that it falls within your potential supervisor's competence. If you are especially interested in a topic that does not fall within your potential supervisor's expertise, your potential supervisor may need some time to do some reading in the area you wish to write on in order to decide if he or she is willing to assess a paper on that topic. In short, it is a good idea to give your hoped-for supervisor some time to consider your proposed topic and to decide if he or she wants to supervise a paper on that topic.

When you have finished the paper, you must have your supervisor and the Director of Undergraduate Studies sign the Senior Project Approval Form, which must also show the grade that your supervisor assigns to the paper. Your paper must earn a grade of at least C for you to have discharged your obligation to write a senior paper.

Contact

Director of Undergraduate Studies
phil-dus@umn.edu
758 Heller Hall

2011-2012
Prof. Naomi Scheman

Contact the Director of Undergraduate Studies to arrange a major or minor. Required forms for arranging a minor are available in the main office (831 Heller Hall).

Senior Project Guidelines (pdf)

Examples of completed senior projects can be found here...