Mission Vista’s MVP Capstone Class

Mission Vista High School’s innovative Capstone Project continues to gather steam. The class, entitled My Vision Personalized (MVP), provides a unique opportunity for final-year students to take all they’ve learned and create an in-depth project based on their own personal passion.

The class is offered to seniors only and is in its sixth year at Mission Vista. Jeremy Walden, Principal of MVHS, explains: “Seniors can enroll in the MVP course during the spring term, which is the last term of their high school careers. 

“The idea behind it is that students get to choose a project they want to complete to showcase their skills, knowledge, and interests that have been cultivated over their high school years. It’s a primarily self-directed class.”

Students will have covered many of Mission Vista's 30+ pathways prior to senior year, and the MVP class lets them propose a project that either isn’t covered, or that may be an advanced version of a completed pathway they want to explore more deeply.

Since the inception of the program, students have used the time and focus the class affords to record music albums in a professional studio setting, write and produce documentaries and short films, and even design curriculum for an advanced level class.

Students submit an application and proposal with their idea in early fall, says Walden, after which they meet and discuss their vision for the project. Here, they learn expected timelines, the support they can receive, how realistic their idea is, and then design a plan to achieve it. 

Robert Chodola is in his third year of running Mission Vista’s MVP program, and he is also one of the school’s History teachers. “During the application stage we're seeing who's serious,” explains Chodola, stressing that it’s important for students to assess whether they are self-sufficient enough to manage their time to meet the class goals and deadlines.

Once students are committed, Chodola works to recruit mentors, mostly other teachers or staff members with a level of expertise in the subject area where the student's project falls. 

The mentors meet with students every week to provide feedback and suggest next steps. “The students get support from mentors and Mr. Chodola is there to keep them on track,” explains Principal Waldoen. “Students reflect on their learning along the way, so it's very metacognitive.”

Participants have about fifteen weeks to complete their MVP project and Chodola says his job includes asking questions like, ’How can I help you manage your time to persevere when things get difficult?’ so that students are ready for the deadline.

Although Mission Vista is a Dual Magnet school, Chodola says most MVP projects are focused on the creative side. “We don't get a lot of STEM projects, probably because of our other program through the national curriculum that focuses on science projects for the real world and jobs. Most seniors are typically doing a project like MVP in that course already.”

Last year, however, there was a standout Science project by a student who has since gone on to study Computer Science at a college in Germany. “He had taken all the Computer Science classes that we have at Mission Vista and ended up helping the teacher design the curriculum for a fifth computer science class here,” says Chodola.

“His MVP project was to design and build our Machine Learning class, also called Computer Science 5, that is now being taught as an advanced pathway.” On the Arts side, Chodola tells of how the course helps aspiring novelists complete a project they’ve been working on for some time. “While pathway Creative Writing classes focus on various aspects and disciplines of writing, the MVP course gives students the time and focus to continue writing their novel and then edit it in the class with the intent to publish.”

Some of his current students are animating by hand or creating comic books, while another is laser-focused on content creation. All participants get to display their work in a showcase in late May, where younger students can learn about the course and decide if they want to sign up in their senior year. 

“It's really cool to see the younger kids see these graduating seniors say, ‘This is a project that reflects and represents who I am and my interests, and also, what I've learned and have been able to do,’” says Walden.

As for graduates moving on to their next chapter, he concludes, “A lot of times these kids will partner with businesses in the community and work for them, or do work in conjunction with these companies and can turn these projects into a viable commodity or service.” All perfect illustrations of how the stepping stones the MVP class provides students do come to fruition.