Honors Program

The Texas Lutheran University Honors Program provides educational challenges and responsibilities for highly gifted and motivated students. Recognizing that honors students are broadly and intensely curious, adventuresome, and creative, the university provides unique honors courses populated only by honors students and taught by professors who relish the pedagogical challenges raised by these dynamic students. In addition to an honors curriculum that provides both traditional and non-traditional mechanisms for learning, the Honors Program offers special features designed to enhance the education of honors students.

Basic Features of the Honors Program

Honors students must satisfy the university’s minimum requirements of 124 credit hours for graduation, and the associated 30 upper-division-hour requirement. Students must maintain a 3.25 cumulative grade point average to remain in the Honors Program.

A. Honors Courses

Students must complete the following courses:

Honors section of the Freshman Experience, FREX 134 HON *
Honors section of Introduction to Theology, THEO 133 HON.
Honors Directed Reading, HONR 331
Honors Interdisciplinary Course, HONR 332
Honors Capstone, HONR 431
Six Honors credits in the student’s major

* Admitted students who have completed FREX 134 and transfer students who are not required to take FREX 134 will receive a waiver for the Honors section. Pre-nursing and nursing students follow a modified curriculum.

B. Distributions of a Liberal Arts Education

Honors students must complete three hours of Arts, nine hours of Humanities, three hours of Natural Sciences (including a lab), and three hours of Social Sciences in order to fulfill their Distribution of Liberal Arts Education requirements, rather than the 6 or 12 hour requirements of the general program.*

* Pre-nursing and nursing students follow a modified curriculum.

C. General Education, Major and Supporting Coursework

With the exception of those changes explicitly mentioned above, Honors students must complete all requirements of the General Education program, as well as all requirements of their major and supporting courses.

Admission to The Honors Program

First-time and transfer students may apply to the Honors Program at two junctures:

During the semester preceding their first semester at TLU
During their first semester at TLU

To be considered for admission, students must have:

3.5 cumulative GPA
Students may nominate themselves or be nominated by their FREX professor for consideration for admission to the honors program.

Please contact the Honors Program director, Dr. Scott Bailey, at sbailey@tlu.edu, to be considered for admission to the Honors Program.

Additional Benefits for Honors Program Participants

Individualized Curriculum Plan: Instead of the regular degree requirements noted above, an honors student may propose to the Honors Program Advisory Committee a customized degree plan which is particularly crafted to meet the intellectual and/or career interests of the individual honors student.
Study Grants: Honors students may apply for funds to support special research and study efforts while they are enrolled at TLU.
Cultural Event Reimbursement: Honors students who attend area cultural events may receive reimbursement for part of the ticket price.
Important information about courses, conferences, graduate scholarship opportunities, cultural event opportunities in the area and on-campus events, etc. are shared with honors students by email correspondence from the Honors Program office.
Restricted Enrollment courses: The 21 hours of Honors Program courses are restricted to honors students.
Special Academic Advising: Honors students formulate their degree plans in consultation with faculty advisors in their majors and the Honors Program Director provides supplemental advising as well.
Social opportunities: The Honors Program Center provides a campus location for honors students and their friends to gather. Social events and field trips are scheduled each semester.

Departmental Honors Courses (Six Hours)

Six of the required 21 hours for honors program students are earned by taking special honors-designated courses in the students’ major fields of study. This 6-hour requirement emphasizes the importance of honors students’ attainment of superior skill in their major disciplines. All six of these hours must be in upper-division courses in the major. A general principle is that courses must, in some notable and obvious way, individualize the learning experience to address the interests and needs of honors students. Honors students with more than one major must take all 6 hours in one major.

Departments, utilizing one or more of the three mechanisms explained below, have formulated plans for their honors students to meet the 6-hour requirement.

Departmental Course Options

I. Catalog Courses with Honors as a course designator

These courses have “Honors” in their course designators. They may be used by any department.

II. Department Courses at the 300 or 400 level.

These may be utilized for honors credit if an honors student has filed an Honors Program Contract Agreement with the Registration and Records office, academic department, instructor of the course and the Honors Program office. Each student, in consultation with the course instructor, must submit a contract to the Honors Program by the second Friday of the semester. The Honors Program Advisory Committee reviews all contracts to determine their suitability.

Honors students register for the course during the regular early registration period, but official designation of the honors credit is not complete until contracts are filed with the Registration and Records office. Please note: 379 Special Topic is a convenient and available option in most departments. It may be utilized for HONR credit when accompanied by an Honors Program Contract Agreement.

III. Independent Study, Directed Study, or Internship courses at 300 or 400 level.

By their very nature, Independent Study, Directed Study and Internship courses entail individualization of the course, and thus do not require Honors Program Contract Agreements to guarantee individualization. Additionally, the approval of the Honors Program Advisory Committee is not required for these courses. Required forms for these courses are provided by the Registration and Records office. Honors or HONR or H must be clearly stated as part of the course description in order to secure honors credit.

Please note: Some departments have their own departmental internships listed in their departmental offerings. For example, BUSI department has a BUSI 419, 429, 439 Internship course; Biology department also has this arrangement. However, in all cases and for all departments, whether they have an internship listing or not in their catalogue offerings, an Internship Agreement form, available in the Registration and Records office, must be completed and filed with the Registration and Records office.

Additional information about the TLU Honors Program is available by contacting the Honors Program Director, Dr. Scott Bailey, at 830-372-6092, or by email at sbailey@tlu.edu.

Courses

Honors Program