The purpose of the honors curriculum is to engage in an honors-level academic experience with other honors students and selected UCI faculty. Courses are designed especially for Campuswide Honors students, and are taught by an elite group of faculty who are passionate about teaching honors students. Many of the courses are team-taught and interdisciplinary, and open up a world of new ideas, issues, and methods of inquiry. They also help students develop and sharpen their reading, writing, mathematical, analytical, and communication skills. Campuswide Honors courses offer small discussion sections, special honors forums, and the opportunity to learn and collaborate with other highly motivated students.
The Honors curriculum consists of Honors Humanities Core and two core course track options: Campuswide Honors Classic Track which includes Honors Social Science Core (Critical Issues in the Social Sciences) and Honors Science Core (The Idiom and Practice of Science, for non-science majors only), and Sustainable Societies which includes Critical Analysis of Health Science Literature, Environmental Issues Facing Sustainable Societies, Social Science Perspectives on the Sustainability of Societies, and Cities: Focal Point for Sustainability Problems and Solutions. The honors curriculum fulfills most of UCI’s General Education requirements.
In addition, honors students engage in undergraduate research under the direction of a faculty mentor. You will develop and implement your own research project or creative performance, and will have opportunities to present your findings at conferences and symposia, and publish your research through UCI’s Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program.
What courses are continuing students required to take?
Campuswide Honors requires all students to complete as much of the honors curriculum as possible, with the minimum for those who enter the program after fall quarter of the freshman year being one year-long honors core course sequence. Depending upon an applicant’s class level, major, and coursework already completed, it could be more. While most transfer students and some continuing honors students may have already satisfied part or all of the Campuswide Honors general education requirement, should students need to fulfill Category II, III, or V they will be expected to complete their remaining general education requirements with the honors curriculum, which has been approved to meet part or all of these areas of general education. In addition, all honors students must engage in research for a minimum of two quarters, which culminates in an honors thesis, creative project, or publication-quality paper.
The Campuswide Honors Core Course sequences currently offered are: