Liberal Studies Commons^™

What Makes A Curriculum Significant? Tracing The Taxonomy Of Significant Learning In Jesuit Honors Programs, Robert J. Pampel

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

Over the last few years, I have sat in the opening sessions of the National Collegiate Honors Council (NCHC) conference and felt equal parts concern and conviction. In 2015 and 2016, opening speakers enumerated the challenges and opportunities that confront honors educators in a rapidly changing higher education landscape. I sympathized with their concerns in an institutional and cultural context marked by what Schwehn called the “Weberian ethos” of education—an instrumental, and less charitable, attitude toward academic inquiry. Yet, even as I acknowledged the veracity of their arguments, I was buoyed by belief in the Jesuit mission that animates my …

Editor's Introduction (Vol. 9, No. 1), Ada Long

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

Even in these perplexing times, most citizens of the United States would agree that social injustices in this country need to be addressed and alleviated. Most would acknowledge the high rates of poverty, hunger, illiteracy, incarceration, economic inequality, racial discrimination, and bias in college admissions, for instance, that undermine the ideals essential to a thriving democracy. The challenge, though, is getting beneath these abstractions to a level of empathy that can bring about change. While the National Collegiate Honors Council has taken on this challenge in years past, the energy and commitment required to meet the challenge has generally waned …

Thinking Critically, Acting Justly, Naomi Yavneh Klos

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

In October 2011, just two months after I became Director of the University Honors Program at Loyola New Orleans, my new home town was simultaneously proclaimed both “America’s Best City for Foodies” (Forbes) and the country’s “Worst Food Desert” (Lammers). The city known for beignets and crawfish, Mardi Gras and jazz, was revealed to have only one supermarket for each 16,000 residents (half the national average), with some residents traveling over fifteen miles from their homes to purchase fresh produce.

In the past six years, the situation has been somewhat ameliorated by multiple farmers markets throughout the city that accept …

Journal Of The National Collegiate Honors Council, Vol. 19, No. 1 (Spring/Summer 2018): Forum On Honors And Social Justice, National Collegiate Honors Council

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

Call for Papers

Editorial Policy, Deadlines, and Submission Guidelines

Dedication to Jack W. Rhodes

Editor’s Introduction — Ada Long

Forum on “Honors And Social Justice”

Thinking Critically, Acting Justly . — Naomi Yavneh Klos

Making Honors Success Scripts Available to Students from Diverse Backgrounds — Richard Badenhausen

Cultivating Empathy: Lessons from an Interdisciplinary Service-Learning Course — Megan Jacobs and Marygold Walsh-Dilley

Socioeconomic Equity in Honors Education: Increasing Numbers of First-Generation and Low-Income Students — Angela D. Mead

Social Justice Education in Honors: Political but Non-Partisan — Sarita Cargas

Research Essays

What Makes a Curriculum Significant? Tracing the Taxonomy …

Making Honors Success Scripts Available To Students From Diverse Backgrounds, Richard Badenhausen

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

In her lead forum essay, Naomi Yavneh Klos thoughtfully encourages us to reexamine our admissions practices in honors. She argues,

"We need a more nuanced reevaluation of standards that recognizes the role of systemic bias in traditional metrics of academic excellence and that holistically evaluates each student’s strengths and challenges in the context of individual and cultural experience. Such practices strengthen honors by identifying a diverse spectrum of students who both benefit from and enrich our honors community. (8)"

I would like to take that call for reevaluation one step further by asking members of the honors community to interrogate …

Social Justice Education In Honors: Political But Non-Partisan, Sarita Cargas

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

In Why Are Professors Liberal and Why Do Conservatives Care?, Neil Gross introduces research that suggests fifty to sixty percent of college professors are leftist or liberal, a much higher proportion than the seventeen percent of Americans in general (7). He posits the conservative fear that “bias” in higher education is a “very serious” problem (Gross 5). April Kelly-Woessner and Matthew Woessner examine studies that also show that college students are more ideologically diverse than the professoriate (498) and, further, that students tend to discredit information presented by biased professors and consider them untrustworthy sources (499). If the majority …

Cultivating Empathy: Lessons From An Interdisciplinary Service-Learning Course, Megan Jacobs, Marygold Walsh-Dilley

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

In “Thinking Critically, Acting Justly,” Naomi Yavneh Klos suggests that the key questions for honors education and social justice are first “how to engage our highest-ability and most motivated students in questions of justice” and second “how honors can be a place of access, equity, and excellence in higher education.” These goals are both important and complementary; achieving the latter helps achieve the former. Honors education creates a fruitful space for inclusion where the knowledge and experience of diverse students develop skills oriented toward justice for the whole community. Making honors a place of access and equity prompts deeper engagement …

From Campus To Corporation: Using Developmental Assessment Centers To Facilitate Students’ Next Career Steps, Rick R. Jacobs, Kaytlynn R. Griswold, Kristen L. Swigart, Greg E. Loviscky, Rachel L. Heinen

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

introduction

For the things we have to learn before we can do them, we learn by doing them. —Aristotle, The Nicomachean Ethics

Honors graduates have much to learn when transitioning into their first position after college. For instance, workplaces have an entirely different culture and set of expectations from undergraduate honors classrooms (Wendlandt & Rochlen). Furthermore, the skills they need to become successful employees or graduate students are different from those required of successful honors college students, with a greater emphasis on communication skills (Stevens) as one example.

Honors students are bright, curious, and hard-working (Achterberg), and honors programs give …

General Strain Theory And Prescription Drug Misuse Among Honors Students, Jordan Pedalono, Kelly Frailing

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

Drug overdoses are the leading cause of death for Americans under fifty years of age, having surpassed deaths from guns, HIV, and even car crashes. Clearly driving this trend is prescription drug misuse, especially of opioids. Of the over 62,000 drug overdose deaths in 2016 alone, a full third resulted from the misuse of prescription opioids such as Oxycodone, Hydrocodone, Vicodin, and Morphine (Katz; NIDA; see also DHS). Evidence indicates that college students are among those losing their lives each year to prescription drug misuse (Spencer), but many facets of prescription drug misuse, including types, prevalence, and especially explanations, are …

Socioeconomic Equity In Honors Education: Increasing Numbers Of First-Generation And Low-Income Students, Angela D. Mead

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

Many honors administrators can cite the numbers and percentages of students of color and statistics on the male to female ratio. Public institutions might cite in-state to out-of-state comparisons. For most, however, socioeconomic status is low on their list, if there at all, even though it is an important measure of diversity. First-generation college students, neither of whose parents has a baccalaureate degree, make up 58% of college enrollments (Redford & Hoyer). Students with a Pell Grant, which qualifies them as having a low-income background, compose 33% of the American higher education population (Baum et al.). Approximately 24% of college …

Editorial Matter: Jnchc 19:1 (Spring/Summer 2018)

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

Cover

Masthead

Indexing Statement

Production Editors

Editorial Board

Contents

Call for Papers

Editorial Policy

Deadlines

Submission Guidelines

Dedication -- Jack W. Rhodes, The Citadel

Forum on Honors and Social Justice

About the Authors

About the NCHC Monograph Series

NCHC Monographs & Journals

NCHC Publications Order Form

Back cover

ISBN 978-0-9911351-9-6

Effects Of Outdoor Orientation Program Participation On Honors Program Completion, Joanna Gonsalves

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

Improving rates of honors program completion is a goal of virtually all honors directors and deans, and research can help identify and evaluate promising strategies. A number of recent empirical studies have investigated predictors of program completion, including students’ admission credentials and honors program features. Though specific indicators of honors program success vary across institutional contexts and even by student cohorts within programs, some patterns have emerged. For instance, high school grade point average (GPA) tends to be a better predictor of honors program success than SAT scores (McKay; Savage et al.; Smith & Vitus Zagurski). Other completion studies focusing …

Honors Student Thriving: A Model Of Academic, Psychological, And Social Wellbeing, Amanda Cuevas, Laurie A. Schreiner, Young Kim, Jennifer Bloom

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

Although academic success in honors programs is easily quantified, student thriving has not been previously measured. Honors students are often recruited to raise the academic profiles of their institutions (Carlson; Hebel) and so tend to excel academically in ways that can be measured by grades and graduation rates. Little is empirically known, however, about their holistic success and wellbeing while in college (Boazman; Moon; Slavin, Coladarci, & Pratt; Walker). Because they are no more immune than other students to psychological and social impediments, they may be succeeding but not thriving in their college experience. Thriving—defined as academic, psychological, and interpersonal …

Journal Of The National Collegiate Honors Council, Open , Vol. 18, No. 2. Fall/Winter 2017

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

Editor’s Introduction — Ada Long

Open Forum Essays

Teaching an Honors Seminar on #BlackLivesMatter in East Texas — Ervin Malakaj, Jeffrey L. Littlejohn, Kimberly Bell, Patrick J. Lewis, and Julia D. May

Helping with the “How”: A Role for Honors in Civic Education — Craig Kaplowitz

A Part Of… or Apart From: A Reflection from South Africa — Ken Mulliken

Mental Health Needs in the Honors Community: Beyond Good Intentions — Maureen Kelleher

Research Essays

Aided by Adderall: Illicit Use of ADHD Medications by College Students — Amber D. Rolland and Patricia J. Smith

Honors …

Moving From Forecast To Prediction: How Honors Programs Can Use Easily Accessible Predictive Analytics To Improve Enrollment Management, Joseph A. Cazier, Leslie Sargent Jones, Jennifer Mcgee, Mark Jacobs, Daniel Paprocki, Rachel A. Sledge

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

Most enrollment management systems today use historical data to build rough forecasts of what percentage of students will likely accept an offer of enrollment based on historical acceptance rates. While this aggregate forecast method has its uses, we propose that building an enrollment model based on predicting an individual’s likelihood of matriculation can be much more beneficial to an honors director than a historical aggregate forecast. Many complex predictive analytics techniques and specialized software can build such models, but here we show that a basic approach can also be easily accessible to honors directors where a small amount of data …

Two Neglected Features Of Honors Advising, Jeffrey P. Hause

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

Recent studies on advising show considerable agreement about the sorts of practices that constitute good advising, whether by a professional staff advisor, an official faculty advisor, or an unofficial faculty mentor. These practices include creating a welcoming atmosphere, building a trusting relationship, and helping the student find resources to envision a flourishing future and make concrete plans to achieve it (Gregory and Edwards; Bloom et al.; Cooperrider et al.). Two important features of advising, though, do not receive the focus they deserve. The first is the advisor’s practice of attention, an activity that forms the basis of a trusting relationship …

Mental Health Needs In The Honors Community: Beyond Good Intentions, Maureen Kelleher

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

In addressing mental health needs in honors communities, I first need to explain that I am not a mental health practitioner; I am a sociologist. The types of issues that interest me are structural: what can we do to set up supportive environments that help all our students. We need to respond appropriately to individuals, but we also need also to look at the larger system (Bertram et al.; JED Foundation, “A Guide”; Atkins & Frazier). For honors educators, the challenges that students face in their daily lives are an ongoing concern. We are all aware of the rising rates …

Institutional Variability In Honors Admissions Standards, Program Support Structures, And Student Characteristics, Persistence, And Program Completion, Andrew J. Cognard-Black, Patricia J. Smith, April L. Dove

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

In the autumn of 2014, the National Collegiate Honors Council (NCHC) launched the Admissions, Retention, and Completion Survey (ARC) in an attempt to collect for the first time honors program benchmarking data on important admissions, persistence, and completion metrics, data that are already widely used throughout higher education generally. The ARC survey is part of NCHC’s ongoing effort to collect such data, which began in 2012 with the first iteration of what has come to be known as the NCHC Census, an omnibus survey asking a wide range of questions about honors administrative practices, curricular offerings, basic staffing, and the …

Teaching An Honors Seminar On #Blacklivesmatter In East Texas, Ervin Malakaj, Jeffrey L. Littlejohn, Kimberly Bell, Patrick J. Lewis, Julia D. May

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

In spring 2017, Ervin Malakaj (Assistant Professor of German) and Jeffrey L. Littlejohn (Professor of History) led a Difficult Dialogues seminar on #BlackLivesMatter for the Sam Houston State University (SHSU) Honors College. The seminar considered the complex historical, economic, and cultural forces that produced the movement along with the various responses to it. By mid-semester, however, the course had become a target for fake news blogs and websites. Critics of the #BlackLivesMatter movement attempted to portray the course as a propagandistic endeavor intended to force a left-wing ideology upon unwilling students who had reluctantly enrolled in the course in order …

Transformative Learning: Lessons From First-Semester Honors Narratives, Kyler Knapp, Phame Camarena, Holly Moore

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

Although the National Collegiate Honors Council has clearly articulated the common characteristics of “fully developed” honors programs and colleges, these elements describe the structures and processes that frame honors education but do not directly describe the intended honors outcomes for student learners (Spurrier). Implicitly, however, the intended outcomes of distinct curricula, smaller course sizes, honors living communities, international programming, capstone or thesis requirements, and any number of other innovative forms of pedagogy are qualitatively different from faster degree completion, better jobs, or higher recognition at graduation. When intentionally directed, honors education promotes the full transformation of the student (Mihelich, Storrs, …

Stimulating The Diffusion Of Innovations In Honors Education: Three Factors, Inge Otto, Chris De Kruif

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

So far, few articles about innovations in Dutch or American honors programs appear to link their findings to an existing body of research about innovations in higher education in general. Although scholars are starting to make this connection more and more (see Kallenberg; NRO, “Excellentie” and “EXChange”; NWO, “Excellentie” and “EXChange”; Jong), both parties could profit from greater contact. Scholars who study innovations in honors programs could benefit from a comparison of their findings to those in more mature fields, i.e., research about innovation in higher education. At the same time, a full model of innovation in higher education should …

Helping With The “How”: A Role For Honors In Civic Education, Craig Kaplowitz

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

The current political moment in the United States puts an exclamation point on years of growing concern for our civic culture. We have a president who neither understands nor cares for the processes and norms of the American system of government, a Congress that seems almost indifferent to the real issues of governing for the public good, a news cycle driven by flippant tweets, and a toxic social media environment. There is little current recognition that, in our system, how we debate the alternatives and arrive at policies is as important for our long-term civic enterprise as the resulting policies …

A Part Of . . . Or Apart From: A Reflection From South Africa, Ken Mulliken

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

“All of humankind originated in Africa,” our tour guide, Richard Randall, announced as he greeted us in Johannesburg, “so I want to welcome you home.” This reminder of our shared ancestry, as distant as it may be, set the theme for this year’s Democracy Project field experience in South Africa. In the summer of 2017, fourteen students from Southern Oregon University (SOU) traveled to South Africa as part of SOU’s Democracy Project. Involving students, faculty members, and community partners, the Democracy Project (DP) is a comprehensive international examination of democracy organized by the SOU Honors College. To solve shared challenges …

Journal Of The National Collegiate Honors Council, Vol. 18, No. 2 (Fall/Winter 2017): Editorial Matter

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

Cover

Masthead

Contents

Call for papers

Editorial policy / Submission guidelines

Dedication: Richard I. Scott

Editor's Introduction - Ada Long

About the Authors

About the NCHC Monograph Series

NCHC Monographs & Journals

NCHC Publications Order Form

Back cover: In this Issue

How The Implementation Of Honors Sections Affects The Academic Performance Of Non-Honors Students, Art L. Spisak, Sam Van Horne, Keri C. Hornbuckle

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

Research in honors education generally credits honors students with elevating the academic experience for all students at an institution (see Andrews; Clauss; Brimeyer et al.). Honors students are seen as having a positive peer effect: setting a standard for other students to follow as well as stimulating and challenging faculty, thereby raising the level of the classroom for all ( Joseph W. Cohen, cited by Andrews 38). Thus, many assume that moving honors students into separate sections adversely affects the academic performance of non-honors students, an assumption we faced at our institution. In the context of a study done in …

Aided By Adderall: Illicit Use Of Adhd Medications By College Students, Amber D. Rolland, Patricia J. Smith

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

“I don’t know that many kids that have done coke, none that have tried crack, and only a few that have dropped acid. I can’t even count all of the ones who’ve taken Adderall” (Stice). This statement made in an interview by a freshman art history major at the University of Maryland, College Park, in 2007 effectively highlights a still growing problem among undergraduate students in the United States: the nonmedical use of stimulant medications prescribed to treat Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) as “study aids.” Even as early as 2004, up to twenty percent of college students had used …

Journal Of The National Collegiate Honors Council. Vol. 18, No. 1, Spring/Summer 2017. Forum On National Scholarships And Honors

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

Contents

Call for Papers . v

Editorial Policy, Deadlines, and Submission Guidelines . vi

Dedication to Peter C. Sederberg. . vii

Editor’s Introduction ix by Ada Long

Forum on “National Scholarships And Honors”

First, Do No Harm 3 by Lia Rushton

The Strange Game of Prestige Scholarships . 11 by John A. Knox

Open Letter to Lia Rushton . 19 by Linda Frost

Of Groomers and Tour Guides: The Role of Writing in the Fellowships Office . 23 by Leslie Bickford

Becoming Legible: Helping Students Navigate Promotional Genres of Self-Narration 29 by Anton Vander Zee

Lessons from Honors: …

Journal Of The National Collegiate Honors Council, Spring/Summer 2017, Volume 18, Number 1 -- Frontmatter

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

Cover

Masthead

Editorial Board

Indexing Statement

Production Editors

Contents

Call For Papers

Editorial Policy

Deadlines

Submission Guidelines

Dedication: Peter C. Sederberg

Slaves, Coloni, And Status Confusion In The Late Roman Empire, Hannah Basta

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

From the dawn of the Roman Empire, slavery played a major and essential role in Roman society. While slavery never completely disappeared from ancient Roman society, its position in the Roman economy shifted at the beginning of the period called Late Antiquity (14 CE–500 CE). At this time, the slave system of the Roman world adjusted to a new category of labor. Overall, the numbers of slaves declined, an event that historian Ramsey MacMullen, drawing from legal debates and legislation of the period, attributes to the accumulation of debt and poverty among Roman citizens in the third century CE. One …

Of Groomers And Tour Guides: The Role Of Writing In The Fellowships Office, Leslie Bickford

Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council Online Archive

When Lia Rushton asserts that “it takes a village to raise a fellowship recipient,” she accurately describes the culture of mentoring and undergraduate research at Winthrop University, where often faculty not only refer students to my office but also email or call me to make sure I plan to seek them out. In one such recent referral, a colleague used a term I’ve heard and winced at many times, suggesting I “groom” a certain student for a particular award. Coming as it did on the heels of my first reading of Rushton’s “First, Do No Harm,” this call made me …