Many applicants to the most selective university programs share high grades, high test scores, solid recommendations and generous doses of community service and volunteer activities. Yet, if they want to set themselves apart from the pool of exceptional students, a significant research experience in STEM or the social sciences helps.
High-quality education in the form of Honors Colleges in Public Universities is becoming ever more common. Within the University of California system most have, including UCLA, UCI, and five of the six colleges of UCSD, special honors programs. The reason behind the growth of these honors programs is public universities want to keep their best students at home, in state, and challenged by a curriculum many believe can only be obtained from the most selective universities.
If you want a solid alternative to the elite private college experience, without the $230,000 price tag, then public college honors programs warrant consideration.
Though honors programs within many public colleges have been around for years, including University of Michigan’s LSA Honors Program, and University of Virginia’s Echols Scholars Program, many students and their families are unaware of the opportunities honors programs provide.
Though heavy research and publishing demands might constrain faculty teaching efforts, many universities are becoming more effective at encouraging undergraduate learning by implementing ‘best practices.’
Research into best undergraduate educational practices by the Association of American Colleges and Universities (AACU) yielded a list of ten: 1st Year Seminars; Required Common Courses; Learning Communities; Writing Intensive Courses; Collaborative Projects; Undergraduate Research; Global Learning; Community-Based Learning; Internships; and, Capstone Projects. The full list, along with a quick synopsis of each practice, can be downloaded at the AACU website: http://www.aacu.org/leap/documents/hip_tables.pdf.
“Innovators aren’t exceptional as much as they are confident.” (WSJ, 17 October 2011, R5)
“…virtually everyone has the capacity to innovate. It’s just that somewhere around fourth grade most of us stop thinking of ourselves as creative…so our ability to innovate atrophies.” (Ibid.)
These are the beliefs, along with a $35 million gift from German software entrepreneur Hasso Plattner, the co-founder of SAP, that have stirred David Kelley to create the d.School at Stanford. The program does not award degrees and is open to Stanford graduate students to learn what it takes to become more innovative. It warrants mention in this column because to survive in the years ahead every student will need to innovate and create both within the classroom and afterwards within their chosen careers.
