Samantha Gassie
Samantha Gassie graduated from Washburn’s MLS program in December. She will be pursuing her Ph.D. in Political Science at Arizona State University and plans to use her MLS capstone research as the basis of her dissertation. I asked her to say something about her capstone experience as many of you are in the process of writing your theses or are pondering possible topics.
Here’s Sam:
Like many of you, when I began thinking about my MLS capstone project I felt a little lost. Every part of the capstone process is difficult, but for me the task of choosing a capstone topic was by far the most frustrating. It seemed as if I had only just begun my work towards the Masters degree when I was asked to decide what capstone project I would focus the better part of a year on. I had no idea what to do. I didn’t even have anything in mind that I thought interesting enough to devote the required amount of research and work to.
After procrastinating and searching fruitlessly on my own for a few months, I finally gave in and asked for help. In all, I consulted four professors from four separate disciplines before I settled on an issue that I felt I could live with. The issue was a research project on the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia. This criminal tribunal is being held to try those members of the Khmer Rouge regime the international community has deemed the “most responsible” for the brutal genocide of the 1970s. If you have never heard of this tribunal, you are not alone. My topic is a relatively obscure one, but though this made some aspects of research difficult, it lent my capstone a value that other topics might not have provided.
The history of why this court was formed was easily researched, but the present-day issues of the court and the court’s effect on the population of Cambodia was not as easy to grasp. In order to fully understand my topic, I decided that a trip to Cambodia was needed. With the help of my advisors, a plan was formed to conduct a series of interviews with genocide survivors as well as staff working at the court itself. I was able to complete 17 interviews which I feel added so much to my capstone. It was a great experience, and I learned much more than I could have ever imagined. Despite my initial difficulties with choosing a topic, my capstone experience has been invaluable to me.
Ustaine Talley
Ustaine Talley was interviewed about her research about her family heritage for an article by Jan Biles in the July 13, 2008, Topeka Capital-Journal, "Woman investigates ties to an all-black colony: We'll tread the prairie as of old." Bile writes, "Her ancestors were among the freed slaves who migrated west after the Civil War and settled an all-black colony on the outskirts of Dunlap, a cattle shipping point on the Missouri, Kansas and Texas Railroad nestled in the rolling prairie between Emporia and Council Grove."
Read this article at the Capital-Journal's web site. 9/13/2008.
Niashia Baker
Niashia Baker portrayed Fanny, a Negro mother seeking freedom for herself and her family, in "Pursuing Freedom from Slavery," a dramatization of Lewis Bodwell’s account of escorting a slave family to freedom. The performance was on July 26, 2008, at the Brown v. Board of Education National Historic Site.
"On the Path to Freedom," was a community heritage program commemorating the sesquicentennial of Territorial Kansans' involvement in the Underground Railroad. The event was sponsored by the National Park Service's Brown v. Board of Education National Historic Site, the Brown Foundation, the Center for Kansas Studies, Washburn's Center for Diversity, and Washburn University's History Department's endowed Gleed Lectureship.
Niashia is the youngest of eleven children and a native of Topeka. She is active in the community as an Americorp Bonner Leader, and has participated in alternative spring break work in California, Louisiana and Wyoming for the past three years. Last July she traveled to Managua, Nicaragua to do two weeks of humanitarian work.
She graduated from Washburn University in 2005 with a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and Anthropology. She currently works as a professional at Capital City School and plans to become a special education teacher.
Read about Niashia and the "On the Path to Freedom" at the Shawnee County Historical Society web site.