There’s a good chance that if you’ve walked around in any city, you’ve passed by defensive architecture. It’s all around us and it shapes the fabric of the city—which is why it’s important to understand what defensive architecture is. This project explored the presence of defensive or hostile architecture, architecture designed to limit the ways in which a space can be used, in Washington, DC. These subtle design implementations act as miniature zoning laws that dictate appropriate uses of public space. Our goal is to educate people on what hostile architecture looks like and who it impacts.

View the "Hidden Hostility" website

This group of Honors students wanted to know: how effectively do Appalachian schools teach about the environment? And, "what are the barriers to environmental literacy in Appalachian schools?" To study this, the students interviewed educators and program directors about the challenges they face in introducing students to the environment, and their successes. They compiled their results into a podcast.

Listen to the "Let's Talk About Environmental Education" podcast

This group examined the US justice system and prison abolition through works of visionary fiction. Visionary fiction is a form of speculative fiction which allows us to imagine beyond the current oppressive structures to see the future we want to create. Through reading works of visionary fiction and creating their own, these teammates created a zine designed to get the reader thinking about their visionary future.

This project provided an analysis of the contemporary issues of Critical Race Theory, the 'Don’t Say Gay' Bill and issues pertaining to culturally restricted content in American public school classrooms. Maddy, Juliana, Heather, Madeline and Emma explored the threat of books being banned from schools by interviewing seven teachers from around the DMV and displayed their findings in the University Library.

View the "Long Story Short" website

For their project, Kathryn, Maddie, Anna, and Takumi explored per- and polyfluroalkyl substances (PFAS) or “forever chemicals” in Washington, D.C. drinking water. They conducted interviews with various PFAS experts, including activists, scientists and policy makers and conducted their own water tests for PFAS in tap water across D.C.

View the full project on their website

How do LGBTQ+ people identify with religion? LGBTQ+ people can face discrimination in religious settings because of their gender or sexual identities. This project focused not on religion itself but on the experience of LGBTQ+ people, specifically within Christianity. Through a combination of a survey and interviews, Abby, Neal, and Alexia asked several LGBTQ+ people about their attitudes and comfort toward their current church and a previous church in their life. They also created a database of hundreds of churches in the DC area and classified them as accepting, neutral, or discriminatory to help LGBTQ+ individuals find welcoming spiritual communities.

View the "D.C. Queer Christianity Project" website