Honors College Council

Voting members present: Viktor Bovbjerg, Angelika Buchanan, Tiah Edmunson-Morton, Alex Grejuc, Matt Johnston, Bob Mason
Voting members absent: Elizabeth Barstow, Nya Buckner
Ex-officio members present: Toni Doolen – Honors College

Review and approve minutes from April meeting.

• We reviewed and approved the Minutes from the April 21, 2021 meeting.

Announcement of upcoming Honors College events – Toni Doolen

• Toni updated us on ongoing work and events in the Honors College. There are expected to be about 200 Honors thesis presentations for students about to graduate. For next year, approximately 540 incoming Honors students are expected. This could be impacted by “summer melt” which is when students who have paid their advance deposits end up not coming or matriculating elsewhere. There are also appeals being heard for admission to the Honors College.
• The Dam Proud fund-raising event was quite successful and over $40K was raised that will be used to augment the tuition needs scholarships from the College. Honors College will now be able to offer 187 tuition needs scholarships which more than doubles the number given in the past. Data indicates that scholarship recipients are 30% more likely to persist than those who do not receive scholarship funds.

Updates on Curriculum changes – Toni Doolen, Susan Jackson Rodgers

• Some curricular and administrative changes were described. The former “University Honors College” is now officially named the “Honors College”. This addresses the awkward phrasing of “the Oregon State University University Honors College” used in the past. There were also 2 curricular changes that fixed wording in the catalog that was no longer correct and one editorial mistake was corrected.

Introduction to new stage 1 course – Toni Doolen

• Toni then introduced progress the Honors College has made on promoting a “thesis completion culture” in Honors College students. Currently, there is a differential in completion rates between students from different Colleges. College of Science and College of Liberal Arts have high thesis/degree completion rates. Other Colleges such as Engineering and Business have lower completion rates. Feedback from students indicates that some may not understand the value of completing their Honors degrees when these students tend to be quite successful in finding employment after graduation. Honors College is developing a Stage 1 course, 1 credit that would focus on meeting and choosing a thesis mentor earlier on in their careers. Data indicate that many students never even choose a thesis mentor so they never get fully engaged in the thesis endeavor. By choosing a mentor earlier in their careers, they would be much more invested in the work of conducting their thesis work and that should result in a higher thesis completion rate. Plans are still being drawn up for this to roll out next year.

Discussion of possible changes to standing rules – Bob Mason

• Our last topic was discussing any proposed changes to our standing rules. The standing rules are as follows:
  The Honors College Council has jurisdiction over the policies and procedures of the Honors College and advises the Honors College Dean. The Honors College Council is responsible for admission and other academic requirements including degree requirements; criteria for selection of the members of the Honors Faculty; maintenance and regular assessment of program quality; and the curricular structure and content of the Honors College.
  The Honors College Council consists of at least six current or former Honors College Faculty members and at least two Students, the students appointed from among the Honors College students.
  Administration of the Honors College rests with the Dean, who shall be an ex-officio, non-voting member of the Honors College Council.
• The HCC discussed the high value of having students on the council. Given the diverse experience students receive in different majors and colleges, it was suggested that adding a student from each of the academic divisions would help to broaden our student input into the work of the council. We thought that this was an idea worth pursuing. Given that the HCC standing rules state that “at least two students…” are appointed to the Honors College Council, it was decided that if four students representing each division were appointed, this would still be in compliance with the current standing rules. If that change is deemed beneficial to the council, a more formal change to the standing rules requiring this student representation could be considered next year. This is a topic for further discussion next year.

Possible new members for Honors College Council?

New Business

• We wished our student member, Alex good luck on his thesis defense, congratulations on his upcoming graduation, and thanked both Alex and Nya for their service on the HCC.

Adjourned at 5:00 PM