Year One
Students in the Honors Program choose an honors first year intensive (FYI) course, and will take a second honors course, HON 100, which introduces the pillars of the program, in the spring semester.
Example FYI courses include: The Psychology of Prejudice, AIDS to COVID: Ethics and Pandemics, The Economics of Women at Home and at Work and Soundscapes & Acoustic Ecology, Co-designing Worlds: Games, Communities and Societal Impact.
Years Two and Three
During sophomore and junior years, students will take one interdisciplinary commons courses of their choosing. Such courses respond to current big topics, and are typically taught by a team of faculty.
These honors courses are designed to:
- Provide a distinct Clarkie approach to education by addressing significant problems that cross academic specialities, so for example, What it Means to be Human incorporates Computer Science, Biology, Philosophy, History, Music, Art, and Theater;
- Encourage community by learning in discussion sessions capped at 30;
- Facilitate interaction and collaboration between faculty and students through a format that introduces students to different faculty members, and to their research/scholarly interests, personal backgrounds, and teaching approaches;
- Recent courses have included: Intro to Global and Critical Digital Humanities taught by Melinda Marchand and Eduard Arriaga-Arango; and The Ethics and the Aesthetics of the Sublime in Art and Society taught by Benjamin Korstvedt and Wiebke Deimling; Text and Image taught by Jan Johnson and Mandy Gutmann-Gonzales.
Year Four
Students complete an honors colloquium course where they share their departmental honors work or interdisciplinary research. This course prepares students for their careers, helps them to reflect upon their honors experience, and provides a forum for the continued improvement of the program — ensuring a tradition of co-creation.
