University Honors Program
The University Honors Program at the University of Cincinnati is atypical from most undergraduate honors programs in that it has very few honors-specific classes. Instead, UHP at UC is focused on facilitating experiential learning experiences for students, so that they may apply their learning in the classroom to the pursuit of their passions outside of it. Thus, rather than offering a section of General Chemistry and one of Honors General Chemistry, UHP will encourage and facilitate students who have an interest in chemistry to explore the field with a funded research internship or a project that examines the role of organic chemistry in everyday life. In this way, UHP at UC creates opportunities for students to explore the world around them in a multitude of different ways.
This is not to say, of course, that UC does not offer honors-specific coursework. In fact, one of the ways that UHP encourages the aforementioned exploration is through the use of interdisciplinary honors seminars. Faculty members across the university's department compete to teach these classes, which are focused on promoting discussion and incorporating critical thinking and reflective techniques into the classroom. Each course, proposed by a faculty member with specific expertise in the area, is centered around a unique topic or theme that is discussed from the numerous perspectives that the students bring to the interdisciplinary classroom. As such, courses are not only engaging and challenging, but also an immense learning opportunity not only about the topic at hand, but about the world at large. To the right, you can find a link to my first honors seminar, which focused on the global interaction of religion and politics.
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All aspects of the Honors Program are also grounded in the one required introductory course in the program: Gateway to University Honors.This first-year course is designed not only to introduce new students to all of the requirements and opportunities available to them, but also to help students discover and explore the passions that will guide the construction of their experiences during their undergraduate careers. Students are exposed to the main thematic areas of the Honors Program -- Global Studies, Leadership, Community Engagement, Research and Creative Arts -- and are guided into uncovering how their interests may align with these areas and be supported by the reflective learning techniques used by the program.
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The Honors Program is able to engage and support its students in their pursuit of academic passions via three main mechanisms. The first, the aforementioned Honors Seminars, allow students a fun twist of the traditional lecture classroom in which they can engage with interesting course material among a diverse group of peers. Some Honors Seminars go even further by engaging students in study abroad experiences after the end of the term, which afford students the opportunity to see their learning take form in the real world. Students also have the option to engage in pre-approved experiences--those endeavors which the University Honors Program staff have qualified as successfully representative of the goals and thematic areas of the program. These pre-approved experiences are often established programs through local or international organizations or employers, and are a popular option among students who might have already been interested in the doing the work that such experiences offer. The most interesting opportunity that the University Honors Program offers, though, is the possibility for self-designing experiential learning projects. In this process, students author a proposal outlining a project that they intend to complete which will help them to further explore their passions. Students choose from among certain learning objectives derived from the program's thematic areas, and incorporate these objectives and accompanying scholarly references (like books, articles, and films) that will be of use to them in their proposals. When submitted and approved, proposed projects become eligible for grant funding, an important resource for students looking to take on projects that might otherwise be too costly. In my own personal experience, I have found that my self-designed experiences as an Honors Student have been the most rewarding--and the projects in which I have felt some of my strongest investment--if only because I had an integral role in creating the project in a way that was tailored to my specific interests.
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My experience with the kind of experiential learning and pursuit of diverse passions encouraged by the University Honors Program precedes my enrollment at UC. As a student who has been fascinated with so many different themes and forms of learning, I have always made an effort to step outside of my pre-medical aspirations and challenge myself to explore new interests. This is the reason for my very diverse coursework even before starting college, as in high school I took college-level classes in language and government in addition to math and science. Included at left is my senior thesis project in AP English Literature and Composition, focused on the author Ernest Hemingway (my personal favorite) and the themes ubiquitous in both his life and works.
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