Each semester, more than 60 faculty and staff from across campus are engaged in Honors. Honors-affiliated faculty:

  • Teach an honors college seminar or department honors course,
  • Coordinate interdisciplinary and disciplinary honors curricula,
  • Mentor honors option agreements or student research projects, or
  • Serve on a faculty committee hosted by Honors.

Honors invites faculty to work individually and in collaboration with their colleges to increase student opportunities across campus and lead students to do more meaningful work. Faculty engagement in Honors often meets guidelines for UNISCOPE Service or Teaching Scholarship.

 
How to Get Involved with Honors Teaching

Faculty are invited to develop and teach Honors College seminars including first-year seminars. To propose an honors college seminar, complete the Seminar Course Proposal form. Courses are reviewed by the Honors College Faculty Council. Instructors who are invited to teach will be required to submit a new course proposal through the Course Information Management (CIM) system.

Faculty also may use the course proposal form to request to teach an existing HNRS seminar course, such as HNRS 351 Survey of Leadership, HNRS 352 Survey of Law and Public Policy, or HNRS 486 Collaborative Research.

Departmental honors courses: Departments may offer an honors (H- suffix) section of any existing department course by adding a cross-listed course through the Course Information Management system (CIM).

How to Get Involved in Honors Outside of the Classroom

Interested faculty may serve as an undergraduate research mentor, as a member of the Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity grants committee, or on the Cohen Honors College Faculty Council, the faculty governance board that oversees Honors curriculum and academic affairs.

Cohen Honors Faculty Fellows

Background and Purpose

The first Honors Faculty Fellows served in summer 2013 to develop the Honors College concept and curriculum. These faculty, in collaboration with the Faculty Senate Honors Committee, articulated the college vision and intended benefits that current Honors-affiliated faculty and faculty fellows support.

We are seeking to actively engage faculty and staff to increase our Honors course offerings and increase or improve Honors and high-impact experiences such as undergraduate research, service-learning, and study abroad across campus. Approximately 350 new students have been admitted to Honors for fall 2019, and we are on track to grow to 800 students by fall 2020. More than 60 areas of study across campus have at least one Honors student.  The recent expansion to Shocker Hall includes a new seminar room and several new study spaces to better serve students and faculty. 

Faculty are invited to submit proposals to fund honors course development and teaching and other projects related to Honors. Fellows often propose research and implementation of high-impact practices/programs such as the recent first-year research experience program (FYRE) developed by a faculty fellow in 2017-18.

Application Materials

Submit to: Campus Box 102 or by email to honors@wichita.edu:

  • A two- to three-page proposal (statement of interest) that includes background sources, if appropriate, information about why you are interested in Honors or high-impact practices, what prepares you for this work, a timeline and budget;
  • A curriculum vitae; and
  • A letter of support from your department chair or supervisor.

Preference may be given to proposals that clearly articulate a connection to current Honors Goals and to the University Strategic Plan.

Selection: Final fellow appointments are made by the Honors College Dean based on the Honors College Faculty Council application review and recommendations. Fellow nominations are welcome from other academic college deans.

Deadline

By May 1st of each year for work during the following academic year. By March 1st for work during the summer.

Eligibility

All fulltime faculty and staff are eligible to serve as Cohen Honors Faculty Fellows. Some Honors -affiliated teaching faculty are selected as fellows based on their tenure of teaching within Honors or on a course proposal in an area such as first-year teaching or study abroad.

Departments, offices, and colleges may submit proposals for development of substantial honors experiences in their college/unit or for collaboration across areas. All individual applications must include a letter of support from the department chair/supervisor.

Expectations

Fellows agree to serve a one- or two-year appointment with possibility for renewal based on project goals and measures. Fellows will establish project goals and measures in collaboration with their chair/supervisor, and the Honors College Dean at the beginning of the fellowship period.

In addition to individual work toward their proposed course or project, fellows are asked to meet once per semester as a group to share project developments including research findings, best practices, challenges, and questions.

Funding

Honors partners with colleges to fund release time or overload and/or professional development such as conference travel, depending on department capacity and project goals. The standard summer stipend for curriculum development or other administrative work is $1500.

Honors Courses

Challenge students to do more meaningful work. An ideal Honors course is, at its core, a laboratory. It boldly challenges assumptions about what we know and how we learn. It emphasizes rigor along with exploration, creativity, and discovery. It should provoke students to engage actively in the learning process. It should empower students to participate in academic dialogue, solve real-world problems through research, and draw creative and compelling connections within and across disciplines.

Honors Outcomes

Honors Outcomes

In addition to University General Education outcomes, Honors education aims to help students:

  • Develop their ability to analyze and synthesize a broad range of material;
  • Understand how scholars and professionals think about problems, formulate hypotheses, research those problems, and draw conclusions about them; and/or to help students understand how creative artists approach the creative process and produce an original work;
  • Become more independent and critical thinkers, demonstrating the ability to use knowledge and logic when discussing an issue or an idea, while considering the consequences of their ideas, for themselves, for others, and for society;
  • Work collaboratively in diverse groups;
  • Reflect on individual and professional development.

Visit the National Collegiate Honors Council website for sample syllabi and more information about Honors teaching and learning. NCHC journals regularly publish articles on Honors education, methodology, and related topics such as “What is Expected of Twenty-First-Century Honors Students: An Analysis of an Integrative Learning Experience.”

Modes of Learning that Support Honors Outcomes
Research and Creative Scholarship (“learning in depth”)
Research and Creative Scholarship courses tend to be created within existing departments, with honors components supplementing regular work. The goal is specialized, in-depth learning in addition to self-reflective, analytical, and creative activity. The products are often documented scholarship that leads to new integrations, new knowledge, or new understandings of creative products; students pursue a track into postgraduate study, technical careers, or professional careers outside academe, such as telecommunications or theatre.
 
Breadth and Enduring Questions (“multi- or interdisciplinary learning”)
Breadth and Enduring Questions courses confront students with alternative modes of inquiry, exploration, discovery, tolerance of ambiguity, and enduring questions. The products often involve creative integrations of evidence from several disciplines with an aggressive emphasis on interdisciplinarity. Assessment of the products emphasizes process rather than product, focusing on metacognitive questions such as “how do you know?” Students are encouraged to dig deep without a prescribed result.
 
Experiential Learning
Experiential (or applied) Learning courses focus on student-driven learning projects facilitated by faculty who provide no necessary, single conclusion to be drawn by all or many students. This includes international experience, service-learning and other forms of active learning.  The process often involves continuous reflective writing and oral presentation as the students articulate their discoveries and document their personal growth.
Honors Faculty Council
Faculty and student participation in the University and College governance is vital to the proper functioning of the University. Faculty interest in direction and development of the Honors College not only reflects their formal right to contribute to University decision making but indicates their responsibility to do so as professional scholars and researchers. The Honors College offers opportunity for faculty and student participation in college governance. Find out more about the Honors Faculty Council.

What is Honors Education? from the National Collegiate Honors Council
“Honors education is characterized by in-class and extracurricular activities that are measurably broader, deeper, or more complex than comparable learning experiences typically found at institutions of higher education. Honors experiences include a distinctive learner-directed environment and philosophy, provide opportunities that are appropriately tailored to fit the institution's culture and mission, and frequently occur within a close community of students and faculty.”