The Honors Experience Proposal Process

Step 1: Consider what type of honors experience you would like to offer:

• An honors-only seminar, course or co-curricular experience (newly designed or an enhanced version of an existing course or program).
• An honors "contract" course or co-curricular experience which is a regular course or co-curricular experience in which the honors students in that course or experience complete additional assignment(s) for honors credit.

Note: Both options listed above can be at the introductory or intermediate levels.

Step 2: Consult with your chair, program director or supervisor about your idea and determine in what semester/year you would like to offer the experience.

Step 3: Contact the Honors Program Director at 529-2021.

Step 4: After reviewing the honors curriculum and learning outcomes on this web site, prepare a written proposal for review by the Honors Program Advisory Committee. Please note that committee approvals must be secured at least one semester in advance of the semester in which an honors course or program is offered.

Proposal Forms

Tier 1 or Introductory Level

• Form for honors-exclusive course or experience (.doc)
• Form for "contract" course or experience (.doc)

Tier 2 or Intermediate Level

• Form for honors-exclusive course or experience (.doc)
• Form for "contract" course or experience (.doc)

Deadlines & Notifications

Important Information

• Honors-only courses have an enrollment cap of 24 students.
• Honors-only courses must have at least 15 University Honors students enrolled in them to be offered.
• Courses which are cancelled due to low enrollment will not be compensated.
• The University Honors Program requests that departments make every effort to enable faculty teaching newly approved honors courses to teach the course at least three times over the span of five years.

Compensation for Honors Experiences

The University Honors Program provides support for educators and departments in the following ways.

• For honors-only newly designed and special topics seminars of three or more credit hours (i.e., 180's, 280's): The educator's division or home department receives $800 per credit hour (or $700 per credit hour for a course taught by a first-time Miami instructor). [NOTE: For CAS courses, the compensation is dispersed to the Dean.] The aim of this compensation is to offer support for replacement instruction so that the faculty member can teach an honors course without undue burden to his or her department.
  
• For honors-only versions of regular Miami courses (identified by the regular course number, followed by an "H"; e.g., POL 241H, PSY 111H) no direct compensation is provided to the educator or department by the University Honors Program.
  
• For regular courses that include a specially-designed honors "contract" enhancement (i.e., a special honors-only addition to a course) offered by faculty on the Oxford campus: The educator will receive $100 in professional development funding at the end of the semester for each University Honors Program student who successfully completes the "contract" enhancement -- up to a limit of $500 per instructor for any one semester .