For honors scholars and subject-area honors students, the senior honors project is the culmination of the honors experience. For many other students, it is their entry into the Honors Program. Senior project students, working with a faculty mentor, earn six credit hours in honors for work that most often culminates in a thesis reflecting substantial scholarship and demonstrating outstanding research and writing skills. In some fields the culminating experience will be a creative work that demonstrates imagination and originality in addition to craftsmanship and professionalism in production.

Students enroll in the project for three consecutive semesters under a 499 course number in the department that best reflects their field of study. If the 499 listing for the respective department is not found in the Schedule of Classes , contact the appropriate departmental secretary. The procedures for registering and for submitting the project proposal are detailed on page 14 and apply to honors scholars and subject-area honors students as well as students entering the Honors Program through the Senior Honors Project.

Independent study for a senior honors project consists of a total of six credit hours (usually 499A, 1 credit; 499B, 3 credits; 499C, 2 credits). Applicants for the Senior Honors Project first register for 499A, a one-credit course, in their junior year.During this independent study, students, in consultation with their faculty adviser, are expected to write the proposal for the project, review the pertinent literature and identify two readers who will help guide the project. Students whose proposals have been approved for a senior honors project will register for 499B, a three-credit course, the following semester. This independent study includes the research and writing of the project. Students register for 499C, a two-credit course, to be taken during the third and final semester of the project. During this independent study, students are expected to complete the writing, make the necessary revisions after consultation with the faculty adviser and readers, and prepare the final document for submission to the Honors Program. The project adviser will assign a grade at the end of each semester that reflects the progress made during that stage of the project.

In September of their junior year and again in February, honors scholars, subject-area honors students, and other qualified students interested in completing a senior project should attend the project workshops offered by the Honors Program staff. Further information about the senior project is found in the Senior Project Handbook available here in .pdf format, or hardcopy in the Honors Office.

Admission to the Honors Program as senior honors project students is open to those juniors, including transfer students, with at least a 3.25 cumulative GPA who give sufficient evidence of initiative, originality and intellectual maturity to warrant the expectation of distinction in the program. Students may do an honors project in any discipline in which they obtain the required permission.

Interested students should contact the Honors Office at the beginning of their junior year to secure an application for 499A, copy of the Senior Honors Project Handbook and information on scheduled orientation meetings. Normally, students register in the fourth block of their junior year for 499A (the first of a three-semester sequence of courses) and submit their completed project proposals to the Honors Office at the end of March. In some cases, however, students must begin the sequence at a different time. Students in Political Science must register for a semester long course not a fourth block course. Students planning to graduate in December or to be away from campus for one of their last three semesters (studies abroad, student teaching, internships) should begin the project four semesters before graduation. These students register for 499A in the fall term of their junior year and submit their completed proposals to the Honors Office no later than November 10.

To complete the Senior Honors Project Proposal, students must identify a faculty adviser—someone with whom they can work well—to guide the project. In consultation with the adviser, they develop a topic that can be properly narrowed for adequate coverage within the scope of an honors project, write the proposal for the project, review the pertinent literature and select two readers who will assist the adviser in guiding the project. For permission to undertake independent study for the senior honors project, students apply to the Honors Program through the department head's or school director's office and with the approval of the dean of the appropriate college.

Acceptance for participation is determined solely by the Honors Program director. Letters indicating a proposal has been approved are sent to the student, adviser, department head/school director and college dean. Applications received after the stated deadlines may be returned with the recommendation that the project be completed as Special Studies (490).

The nature of the research in some fields may demand a slightly varied procedure from that outlined above. In such cases procedures developed by the respective department will take precedence. Variations, in any event, are slight, and the basic principles established for the total number of credit hours (six), the submission of proposals in a student's junior year and independent research with individual faculty mentoring are constant.

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