Senior Capstones can vary from making dresses and stuffed animals to coaching kids to building items for the community. Capstones are an opportunity for young adults to spot a problem, fill a need, and connect deeply with the community. Victoria Kordick, a Newtown High School senior, decided to use her creativity to spark joy and inspiration in the lives of people who need it most: patients on Yale New Haven’s clinical trial floor.

Kordik has a special relationship with Yale New Haven’s clinical trial floor because her mother was a patient there a few years ago. Her mother was diagnosed with an aggressive, rare cancer that affected her kidneys, liver, and ovaries. Her original prognosis was bleak.

“She was given one year left to live like two times,” Kordik said. “It was like three years ago she was given her first, and two years ago she was given her second year to live.”

Her mother participated in one of Yale’s clinical trials, and now Kordik said she is “technically cancer-free,” but still takes her treatments to keep the cancer at bay.

“It’s because of this clinical test treatment that she was a part of [that she is still alive],” Kordik explained.

So, when it was time to figure out a capstone project, Kordik played around with a few ideas. She said at first, she wanted to attempt a Dungeons & Dragons module, but realized it would have been too much work for the amount of time she had.

As a birthday gift, Kordik’s grandparents gifted her the essentials to start crafting pottery. Kordik explored the art form and ultimately decided to use this newfound interest as her capstone project.

“I decided to make pottery, specifically bud vases, which typically only hold one to two flowers, to donate them to the clinical trial wing at Yale Hospital,” Kordik said. Kordik aimed to make 14, but had a few mishaps in the process. Some of the vases cracked in the kiln, so she ended up with ten.

On Tuesday, May 26, Kordik went to Yale New Haven Hospital and handed out ten vases. Eight patients and two nurses received vases — one of the nurses actually worked with Kordik’s mother when she was a patient.

The process of creating pottery pieces is slow going. Kordik explained she had to create the vases with about one to one and a half pounds of clay, center each on the wheel, create the vase, and wait for the clay to dry. The vases were then fired in the kiln once, glazed, and then fired again.

Kordik shared a bit more of the process: “You can’t put the pre-glazed pots and the after glazed pots in the same kiln at the same time because you need two different temperatures.” It took her about three months to create all the vases from start to finish.

She added that her mother was the one who encouraged her to use pottery as her capstone and helped her get into contact with the hospital. Kordik did not have a theme for the pots; she wanted them to be “diverse” so the patients could pick their own vase.

“It’s mostly for the patients to be able to have something that they like and that they can see that’s colorful, that can bring hope and determination, and also remind them of my mother’s story,” Kordik said. “I talked to them about my mother and their own treatment stories … while giving the pots … and I just really wanted to be able to show them that this treatment does work, that there is hope as long as they [hold on].”

The pots were filled with flowers before Kordik dropped them off to the patients. The patients shared with Kordik where they were going to put the vases in their homes. While visiting the patients, Kordik was able to talk to them and discuss their treatment stories, too.

Kordik talked a little bit more about the bigger impact. “These pots … let me connect to these people and hear stories that I would have never even thought to hear about or thought to listen to beforehand.”

One of the patients Kordik talked to had the same type of cancer her mother had. She was honest, and said that it “hit a little bit hard.”

“I hope with my mother’s story and stuff that it was able to give [the other patient] hope,” Kordik said of the exchange.

Kordik added that she hopes her capstone will shed some light on the resources needed to get this life-saving medication out to people who need it.

“They do need a lot in order to get this medicine out to people,” Kordik said, “and this medicine is working.”

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Reporter Sam Cross can be reached at sam@thebee.com.