Honors Option Contracts

Honors Option Contracts allow students to enroll in and receive Honors credit for any course, except for courses already designated Honors sections.  Students may complete an Honors contract in lieu of enrolling in any Honors-designated sections.  This allows students great flexibility to pursue and develop their own individual academic interests.  In order to develop an Honors Contract, students select a faculty member to work with and develop an agreement with him/her about alternative work that the student may complete to receive Honors credit for the course.

When students and faculty agree on a contract, they will agree on what work will be done with the class, the schedule of individual meetings with the instructor, and some way for the student to use his/her work to benefit the class or a community.  These Contracts are excellent preparation for graduate or professional programs because they provide students with an opportunity to interact with professors in a professional setting.  These contracts also foster independent learning and discipline, by expecting the student to take charge of directing the alternative work undertaken with limited feedback from professors.  These type of preparation is immensely important for Capstone work, where students will meet even higher expectations for professionalism and academic success.

Students have completed a variety of Honors Contracts in the past.  In some contracts, students read and develop an extensive annotated bibliography in preparation for their Capstone.  Other contracts may be more exploratory such as doing additional lab work for a chemistry or physics class, or