There are many ways that faculty members can work with Honors students to enhance
their pathway through the university. These experiences not only enrich students'
educations, they can be quite invigorating for faculty members as well. Some
available options for faculty members are listed below. Please contact the
Honors College
Dean or
Assistant Dean, or work with your department chair to determine the best
option for you.
Types of Honors Courses
-
Traditional/Regular Honors Course: Honors sections of traditional courses are typically restricted to Honors students (though exceptions can be made for high-achieving students who are not enrolled in the Honors College). Most Honors courses at WVU are capped at 25 students, and are developed to contain some particular enrichment component to the course.
-
Honors Foundations Courses: These special-topics Honors courses are developed
to meet both
Honors goals and GEF goals. Participating Faculty typically work through
the
Honors Faculty Fellows program and teach one section per semester of their
proposed course.
- Honors Add-on Course: Honors add-on courses are 1- or 0-credit courses associated with a larger lecture course. By design, they enrich the larger course externally by breaking out Honors students into a smaller setting in order to delve deeper into the subject matter and complete significant additional assignments for independent or group work. Students register for both the regular course as well as the dedicated Honors add-on section for that particular class.
- Cross-listed Honors Section: For smaller courses that do not have a critical mass of Honors students to support a whole section, a cross-listed course can provide an option to add enriched content for a smaller segment of the whole course. For example, a course that usually enrolls 50 could have section 001 enroll 45 students and section H01 enroll 5 Honors students. Both sections meet together, but the Honors section has a different syllabus with an additional enriched component. Ideally, such sections would also provide an opportunity for Honors students to collaborate or interact in some meaningful way.
- Contract Course : For students to contract a course as Honors, a student works with a faculty member to supplement a regular with individualized Honors material. It is the student’s responsibility to meet with the faculty member and set this up in a timely manner. Applications for the contract course must be submitted to the Honors Office by the first half of the semester.
- International Study/Study Abroad: Students who do a study abroad experience (defined as outside the fifty US states) for WVU may apply to have this count as Honors credit. Since we want to encourage study abroad, these petitions are almost always approved. Students are asked to keep a journal (or online blog) and write a reflection paper about their time abroad to document the experience. Faculty-led programs can facilitate this credit by building this work into the syllabus.
- Independent Study/ Undergraduate Research: One-semester or summer experiences for credit that have a strong academic component and are in some way out of the ordinary are eligible to count for Honors credit. Typically, credit under 495 and 497 common course numbers are eligible to apply for Honors credits, though other course numbers can host such experiences as well.
- Summer Guided Reading: Summer guided reading courses are most frequently taken by students who are second semester admits or students who need to catch up on Honors hours for one reason or another. These courses are offered over the summer and students most often do not need to be on campus to take the class. Each summer guided reading course varies depending on the subject and the instructor.
- Thesis/Senior Project :Students on the Presidential Honors track (admitted Fall 2016 or earlier) have many options to complete an Honors thesis/senior project, several of which require dedicated faculty advising. Students admitted Fall 2017 an after will have an opportunity to apply for the new upper division Honors program to begin in Fall 2019. This program will revolve around a central student-designed, multi-semester experiential learning opportunity via study abroad, undergraduate research, or internship.