Honors College Council

Voting members present: Eliza Barstow, Michael Burand, Matthew Johnson, Sandy Neubaum
Voting members absent: Hilary Schaffer Boudet, Emma DeFreeuw, Jessica Fujinaga, Adam Gross, Kathryn McIntosh, Sam Logan, Jax Richards, Bo Sun
Ex-Officio member present: Toni Doolen – Honors College Dean
Guests present: Susan Rodgers

1. Assessment
   • The Honors College (HC) was missed in generating the schedule for unit-level assessments in AY23, but Alix Gitelman and Phil Mote will work on this over the summer. HC data is tricky, as our students are also in other colleges.

2. Diversity, Equity & Inclusion (DEI) Learning Outcomes
   • Sue worked with students in the Student Leadership Circle to come up with DEI Learning Outcomes (LOs) that can be added to the HC Learning Outcomes. Toni suggested that rather than retaining all four of the DEI-focused outcomes, we might want to choose just one of these outcomes and add it to the existing Honors College Learning Outcomes.
   • Michael pointed out that not all of the existing LOs for DEI are measurable, and we all agreed.
   • It was also noted that some of the Learning Outcomes seemed more focused on co-curricular experiences.
   • Sandy noted that some of our goals may be covered by the new Core Education curriculum, and Toni agreed but said there may be student needs we can meet that are not met by the new Core Education. We’re going to compare them against new Core Education LOs.
   • Some questions that arose:
     • Should we have a course that all HC students take (other than stage 1 of thesis)?
     • Sue wondered if HC could mandate honors sections of DPO courses. Toni and Sandy noted that this could be difficult, as some colleges currently specify which Bacc Core (soon to be Core Education) courses their students must take.
   • Sandy brought up that students are concerned about how to have difficult conversations, and she expressed concern that no one is teaching on this topic. (Eliza is actually teaching a course on this topic in the fall, but at present, Sandy is 100% correct that no one is teaching on the topic.)

3. Graduate Courses
   • Toni introduced the idea of offering Honors credit for grad classes for students so that they can count such a course towards their honors degree requirements. She noted that this is already a practice at many other honor colleges and in other honors programs.
   • Our HC students need 12 credits of honors electives if they are honors scholars (start first year) versus 6 credits if they are on the honors associate track.
   • Some considerations:
     • Many of our students are part of accelerated masters programs, and Toni wants to make sure that students would be able to double-count these courses. (In an Accelerated Masters Program, students can take up to 22 grad credits and count them towards their undergrad degree.)
     • At present, students can receive honors credit for OSU study abroad.
     • Grad classes often have extra capacity and units might be very supportive of filling “open” spots with HC students
     • We could talk to Associate Deans of grad programs to see what they would think of this idea.
     • Would we let instructors decide if honors students could take their classes, or would we have unit-level heads make decisions?
   • The Honors College Council will need to vote on this next year