SUNY Oneonta Honors Program Draft Revisions as of May 2010 by the Honors Advisory Committee Todd Ellis 3 May College Senate Meeting

The Current Honors Program Three Tiered: Stage One - Freshman Year - 9 credit hours of honors GE2 courses Stage Two - Sophomore Year - 9 credit hours of honors GE2 courses Stage Three - Junior/Senior Year - 9 credit hours of upper division coursework including a capstone experience

The Current Honors Program Retention Standards 3.5 GPA at the end of each year + sufficient progress toward degree Capstone Experience An interdisciplinary or mutlidisciplinary course designed by students

The Main Concerns Students often have few choices of courses available to them because they have placed out of GE2 courses and because few are offered (and those have low enrollment) Students get “Honors Program” credit for completing any one tier - many drop out when early scheduling no longer useful By getting out before tier three - they miss out on the interdisciplinary focus of an honors education

The new idea The Honors Advisory Committee has been meeting since the fall to revamp the program The main themes: Embrace interdisciplinary focus of honors education Enhance communication skills through required honors level composition courses Allow students to get honors credit by contract with professors Eliminate tier system, and require all honors students to complete thesis to get credit

The Contract Model Allows students to approach a professor by the end of the third week of a class to propose a plan to make the course count as honors credits Focus is not necessarily on more work, but on different, more in-depth, interdisciplinary, or original work. Must be agreed upon by both professor and student - not all courses may be appropriate for this, but faculty have input Less time consuming for faculty than an entire honors course Dedicated honors sections/courses will still exist

Honors Advisors We are proposing that departments would have one designated honors advisor Honors advisors would be able to help explain the contract process and make sure that it is not abused by either party Honors advisors would require yearly meetings with honors students to make sure they are thinking ahead about their additional requirements

Year by Year - First Year Maintain a 3.5 GPA Enroll in an Honors Composition Course capped at low number per section ESL students may get individual waivers Honors first-year interdisciplinary seminar Thematic courses taught be rotation of instructors Focus is on critical thinking skills 6 credits of honors course work

Year by Year - Second Year Maintain a 3.5 GPA By end of year, have 12 honors credits completed Academic plan with an honors advisor to begin planning for capstone/theses

Year by Year - Third/Fourth Year Maintain a 3.5 GPA By graduation, have 12 additional honors credits completed These credits may include honors independent studies to facilitate thesis writing Upon completion of thesis and all other requirements, students are given honors designation

Other thoughts We are considering making the admission process more selective with online essay prompts that students would have to answer We want to reinvigorate the honors club, so that they can be an academic presence on campus, perhaps with their own faculty awards or hosted lecture series - there is a funding issue that still needs to be address here

We are still welcoming input We are not making any proposals for voting today, but want to give you a chance to think about how this would work and give us a chance to answer your questions/concerns We think that this makes the program more robust, more rigorous, and easier for students to become invested in. In short, I think it makes the honors program meaningful for everyone involved Please contact myself or Julie Freeman if you have any additional concerns