This study investigated the impact that co-curricular programming delivered by the University Honors Program (UHP) at North Carolina State University through the Honors Forum course had on first-year students' self-reported knowledge of civil discourse, their assessment of its importance and impact, and their evaluation of their commitment to the…

The purpose of this mixed methods study was to identify the relationship between grit and anxiety within first-year honors college undergraduate students through student surveys, interviews, and archival data. Identifying this relationship may result in additional supportive honors programming in future years as well as add to the understanding of…

A series of courses on the Evolution of Ideas introduces interdisciplinary study, develops collaborative discourse, and promotes a sense of community among first-year honors students. The curriculum encourages faculty to use a range of strategies to help students understand an idea and its history while also fostering awareness as to its social,…

Topics and resources from honors education are used to teach argumentation in writing composition. The author discusses efficacies for increasing student awareness of, and reflection on, issues in honors education while engaging first-year students in honors issues that directly affect their lives.

Precipitated by a surge in enrollment, authors describe the three-phase revision (2017-2021) of a first-year peer mentoring program in honors. Grounded in student input and leadership, large-scale programmatic changes involve curriculum expansion, student leadership development, and co-curricular experiential support. Program objectives,…

This essay explores the conceptual and practical implications of an honors forum relating to artful expression and the phenomenon of sequester in place (SIP). As monthly general education offerings for first-year students, Honors Forums feature an array of thematic events associated with the freshman cohort. Noting challenges relating to remote…

Course-based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs)have been shown to result in increased science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) persistence, but such experiences are rarely available for first-year STEM students. This work outlines the development and integration of a CURE into a year-long honors general chemistry laboratory…

A simulated conference in first-year curriculum reinforces undergraduate research as beneficial to both honors and campus communities while fostering scholarly development and campus engagement among honors freshmen during the coronavirus crisis.

Authors describe course-embedded research experiences at a diverse, rural, regional university. Emphasizing the capacity for conventional teaching and learning in first-year honors composition, these experiences provide relationship-rich education through faculty and peer mentorships. Positing that first-year honors composition is undervalued as a…

Engineering and pop-culturist instructors team-teach a first-year experience course exploring science through the lenses of history, literature, film, television, and sequential art. Authors present science fiction discourses as unique for synthesizing fields in the humanities and STEM, and they present curricular and co-curricular design…

Involvement in honors programs provides students an opportunity to grow academically, connect with like-minded peers, and reap tangible and intangible benefits. Understanding the motivations driving this involvement is a crucial task for honors program administrators and faculty alike as different motivations may influence how students engage and…

By incorporating visual mapping into students' thinking and writing processes, a narrative assignment in geo-literacy creates a reflective and agency-based learning experience for student writers in a first-year honors seminar.

This study presents perceived advantages of thematic, team-taught interdisciplinary seminars for first-year honors students. Two student cohorts (n = 174) surveyed in two subsequent years (2018, 2019) weigh in on the challenges and benefits of different team-teaching models. Three first-semester offerings on the themes "Food,"…

Responding to pervasive mental and physical stresses of the COVID-19 crisis, the author assigns first-year students various routine wellness practices for one hour each week along with requisite reflective writing exercises. Student expectations, experiences, and outcomes are presented.

Students who begin in honors do not always complete program requirements. As an investigation into student retention, the author introduces a degree-planning workshop into a freshman seminar. The study involves two groups of students from different incoming classes: one (2018) participating in their degree-planning through the workshop and the…