Honors Program: About the Program

From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked. Luke 12:48
 
During the first two years in the Honors Program, students will focus on reflectively integrating their classes and experiences through the Core questions. Each student will be assigned a faculty mentor to aid in this process. Mentors will meet with their students over lunch or coffee or on a walk around campus. They may go to dinner, take in a soccer game or see a play. During these encounters, discussions will ensue about how ideas from classes fit together, where the student’s passions are leading him or her, and what intellectual avenues he/she might want to pursue. Each year, students will write essays reflecting on the Core questions in the context of the classes taken and their lives. Beyond that, reflection essays will chart the growth and direction of the student over the first two years. At the end of their sophomore year, students will participate in a reflective retreat and develop personal statements to aid them in taking full advantage of the opportunities available to them in their final two years.
 
The curricular requirements for the Honors Program include one three credit hour Honors Course each year, marked below by an asterisk. To remain active in the Honors Program, students must maintain a GPA of 3.0, complete all Honors assignments, and be regular participants in Honors events.

Honors Program Overview

Freshman Year	Sophomore Year	Junior Year	Senior Year
Honors Colloquium Honors Core Course*	Honors Core Course* Sophomore Retreat	Major Specific Honors Course* Honors Reading Course	Senior Honors Project* Honors Reading Course

First Year Honors Colloquium
The week before school commences, thirty students accepted into the Honors Program will gather for an Honors Colloquium. This will be a great opportunity for students to get to know their peers and to create a strong sense of community. During this week, students will be challenged by some of the best professors at the University and participate in a number of field experiences and cultural events.
 
Honors Core Courses: The Core Experience
The bonds created during the Colloquium will be strengthened in the fall term of the freshman and sophomore years, as students will be registered for a designated Honors class. These classes will satisfy University Core requirements and provide students with unique approaches to specific disciplines. The freshman core course is composed solely of freshmen Honors students, while the sophomore core course includes other high-achieving students in addition to the sophomore Honors students.
 
Major Specific Honors Courses
The last two years of the Honors Program are focused around a student’s major program(s). In the junior year, Honors students take a course required of them by their major discipline, though they sign up for it as an Honors course. Thus, students will have a slightly different syllabus, determined by the faculty of the major program, which will require them to dig deeper on a topic and report back to the group.
 
Senior Honors Project
In the senior year, honors students will complete a project that will allow them to demonstrate mastery in their declared major. Each program will determine the format for the project, but all projects will have a public component aimed at a general audience. In most cases, this project corresponds to a capstone experience in the respective major, though in disciplines where the capstone project is a joint project, Honors students also write a paper that explains the project to non specialists. In this way honors students will be prepared to continue the work of the public intellectual.
 
Honors Reading Courses: Interdisciplinary Reading and Discussion
During the junior and senior years, honors students take a total of two one-credit classes where faculty from across the campus lead students in focused investigation of a specific topic. The Honors Reading Courses are narrowly-focused courses that are designed to be an intensive investigation of a topic in a discussion-based environment. These courses allow students to interact with faculty outside their major and continue the interdisciplinary approach of the first two years.