<p>a senior i met on campus mentioned that seniors are doing their senior papers right now. i thought yale didn't have a capstone project.</p>
<p>certain majors have a senior thesis (especially the history major where you pretty much have to write a book - my roomate wrote a biography and it was published!). Science majors might have a research paper on research you have done. Other majors require a senior seminar whose requirements will be to do a major paper. It really varies on the major.</p>
<p>I have a copy right here of my D's recently completed senior history thesis. It is, as the department specifies, about 50 pages in length, an exceedingly substantial piece of primary historical research but in no way "a book." You have to write one if you are a history major. She loved doing it. Yale even gave her money to travel down south to do research in a state archive. Many senior history projects do end up getting published in scholarly journals.</p>