Section Home

Honors Courses

What are Honors courses?

One of the requirements for the Honors Program is to have all currently enrolled students take 3 honors courses. An Honors Course is any majoring class that you choose to be considered honors. Depending on the professor and the level of difficulty of the course, you might get extra assignments, quizzes, papers, or even exams in the class. These courses must be taken in the field in which you are majoring in, so if your major is either Chemistry, Biology, or Accounting, the honors courses that you take must be within that specific field. If you're majoring in Biology, you shouldn't be taking honors courses in Philosophy or Accounting, stick to your field. You must get permission from the Honors program to take a course outside of your major under a special circumstance.

How to Switch Your Regular Course into an Honors Course

Honors courses must be declared within the first week of the semester, there are different steps that need to be taken in order to declare an honors course. You must take the proper paperwork to your professor and the department chair. You need their permission in order to make that specific course honors. After the paperwork has been filled out you must bring it to us so we can approve it and send it out to the registrar so they can make the changes official. Remember that all of this needs to be done within the first 2 weeks of the semester, every department has its deadlines that need to be met, do not wait until the last minute to have this done.

We require that you take 3 Honors courses overall with B or better grades for each course, not every semester, so you are able to space them out however you prefer, we do not suggest you take all 3 in one semester. Do not risk getting a bad grade and lowering your GPA.

The professor should be a full-time faculty member, however, students are encouraged to consult the Honors program if there's a special circumstance.

The Terms of the Contract

The honors student is expected to do in addition to the regular coursework (as outlined in the syllabus for the course). Please keep in mind that this work should give the student the opportunity to study, in-depth, a topic related to the course material. It is suggested that the additional work constitutes approximately 2-3 hours of extra work per week ( for example journal reading, writing a proposal, studying an extra book, etc).

Contracts

Click the links below to access the contracts.

Student's Honors Course Contract

Professor's Honors Course Contract