Elon University - National Collegiate Honors Council

Application for NCHC Consultant Grants
Response ID:6 Data
1. Page One
1. Applicant Information
Institution
Elon University
Date Honors Program/College Established
1980
Honors Administrator First Name
Tom
Honors Administrator Last Name
Mould
Email Address
tmould@elon.edu
Phone Number
3362785746
2. Specific Information on how the Institution will provide Matching Funds (not in kind contribution) for Consulting Visit:
Elon University has an institutional budget for external reviews. Associate Provost Tim Peeples has committed to covering any
existing costs of an external visit not covered by a NCHC mini-grant.
3. Concise Description of Need for Consultant:
Our first and only external review of our Honors Program was conducted in 2007. Although that review suggested our
program is exceedingly strong, there were a number of excellent suggestions for improvement, many of which we have
undertaken in the intervening years, a few of which we have yet to tackle. The program has changed significantly since 2007,
and we are overdue for another review. Since 2007, we have had 2 new Directors, and 1 new Associate Director. The current
Director started in the fall, 2013; this coming fall, we will have a new Associate Director. This is an excellent time for an
external review, as these new leaders are excited about exploring new initiatives for strengthening our program even further.
The timing is also ideal because our current 5-year plan will expire next year; a review will provide us vital information in
creating the next 5-year plan, as well as a strategic vision guiding it. In addition to wanting to ensure that we are implementing
the best practices for Honors Program, we have a number of new goals and initiatives outlined in the attached rationale
document that we would like to discuss with an external reviewer. For all these reasons, we feel that having a review of our
program would is both timely and necessary, and that it will be exceedingly rewarding and productive.
4. Year Institution joined NCHC
2000
5. How many self study/program reviews have been completed?
1
6. Attach rationale
NCHC Site Visit Rationale.docx
7. Attach supporting documents
2. Thank You!
Notification
Mar 24, 2015 16:21:24 Success: Email Sent to: tmould@elon.edu
Rationale / Elon:
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Rationale for Honors Program Site Visit
Elon University Honors Program
We are applying for a NCHC mini-grant to help provide the funds to bring a NCHC approved site reviewer
to our campus in the fall, 2015. Our rationale for seeking an external reviewer at this time is based in
five major areas.
1. Changes to Leadership: In the Fall, 2014, Tom Mould became the new Honors Director. He
joined Michael Carignan who has been the Associate Director since 2008. Neither were part of
the Honors Program when the last review was conducted in 2007. In the Fall, 2015, we will have
a new Associate Director, Lucinda Austin who will take over for the year, followed by Barbara
Miller, who will take over for a 4-year tenure. This seems like the perfect time to assess where
we have come since 2007, and where these new leaders can take us in the next 5 years.
2. Changes in Program: Since our first and last external review in 2007, the program has changed
sufficiently to require another review. At that time, our program had just gone through a major
transition from a program based on lateral admission and “honorized” courses, to a rigorously
structured, 4-year cohort program tied to admissions with a major thesis project and scaffolded
curriculum. The 2007 review focused on this major change and suggested a number of revisions
to continue to improve the program. Since then, we have enacted a number of those
suggestions (though not all), as well as made some additional changes. They include:
o New Course Model: responding to concerns of a lack of choice among Honors classes
and variable quality of the courses and instructors, we applied a number of strategies to
strengthen our courses including developing a solo-taught, multidisciplinary, sophomore
seminar in addition to the team-taught interdisciplinary seminars we currently offered.
This allows us to offer between 2 and 4 choices in courses in any given semester, when
in the past the most we could offer was 2.
o First Year Winter Term Study Abroad: Three years ago, we created a new team-taught
Winter Term course in Turkey. Students compete for 12-15 spots on this substantially
subsidized, 3-week study abroad course. We would like to explore funding opportunities
to increase the available slots.
o Teaching in Honors: In order to attract the best teachers on campus to teach in the
Honors program, we raised the amount of money faculty get to plan their courses and
began paying faculty a small stipend each time they teach. We also developed a 3-day
Honors Teaching Workshop for faculty who are, will be, or are thinking about teaching
in the program.
o Writing Workshops: This spring, we launched a new writing workshop for students
preparing to propose their Honors Thesis. We would like to consider additional writing
workshops for the Presentations of Progress and the Thesis itself.
o Honors Fellows Community Director: In order to build a stronger sense of community
among and across cohorts, we developed a student position who is paid a stipend
throughout the year to organize study and social events, match students with peer
mentors, organize the service activities, and serve as a liaison with the Honors Directors.
o Mental Health/Stress Workshop: Last year we began offering a mental health/stress
workshop for all students. This year, we offered the same workshop for first year
students only. We are working with a few Honors students to make this workshop more
useful.
Rationale / Elon:
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Living Learning Communities: We formalized a budget for our two LLC’s ($2,000/year
for each) so that faculty advisors and floor leaders could more effectively plan
community strengthening experiences that serve the program.
o Grade Requirement: Honors students must maintain a 3.0 GPA in their Honors courses,
and until last year, a 3.2 GPA overall. They must now maintain a 3.3 overall GPA.
o Service: Two years ago, we began offering an overnight service trip to students as a
means of working with the community and creating a chance to bond across cohorts
and get to know the Directors better. More recently, students have been developing an
on-going service project called “Gear Up” in which they mentor high school juniors
applying for college, particularly first generation college applicants.
3. Strategic Plan: A new strategic plan is needed. We currently have a 5-year plan that will run out
in 2016. An external review will be critical in helping to establish a new, comprehensive,
ambitious yet feasible strategic vision to guide a new 5-year plan for the program.
4. Best Practices: We have worked to keep up with the literature on best practices in Honors
programs and in teaching and mentoring high-achieving and gifted learners, both by reading the
Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council, as well as attending the NCHC Annual
Conference. However, an external reviewer would help us identify emerging best practices that
we either have not encountered or have yet to try for lack of resources or support. In addition to
ensuring that we are engaged in the most effective practices for Honors programs, we are
interested in better understanding how our program parallels and differs from other Honors
programs in schools similar to Elon. We believe an external reviewer will be able to provide
greater context for us and better help us articulate a distinct identity for our program.
5. New Goals: Finally, we have some new goals we would like to discuss with an external reviewer.
Specifically:
o Increase our efforts to recruit students from diverse ethnic, national, and socioeconomic backgrounds
o Develop more effective assessment strategies (both direct and indirect) for the program
generally as well as specific parts
o Rework our current semester “workshops” from info sessions to more useful, engaging
workshops
o Revise Elon 101—our 1-credit class that introduces students to college life—to better
frame the expectations for intellectual climate and community across our campus
o Consider the possibility of lateral entry to invigorate the program with high-achieving
students, and find a home for those students who truly excel their first year here but
who are not in a Fellows program
o Revisit the recommendations from the 2007 external review that we did not implement.
o Clearly articulate and implement course strategies “to encourage risk, creativity and
challenge in both teaching and learning in honors” (HP Review 2007:8).
o Improve our connection to alumni, both in terms of tracking their successes as well as
involving them with our current students for networking and mentoring
We are very excited by the possibility of bringing in an experienced program reviewer to help us build on
what is working, revise what is not working, and implement new strategies and initiatives to make our
program as effective as it can be. Ultimately, we would like to become a nationally-recognized model for
other small, liberal arts universities.
In preparation for such a review, we will develop and compile a packet of materials that would include
the following:
Rationale / Elon:
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Report on Current Program: The program reviewers in 2007 praised the Honors Directors at the
time—Mary Jo Festle and Janet Myers—for their thorough documentation of the program and
the materials they shared to facilitate the review. We will use their report as a model for our
own. To begin, we will include information on all of the following topics related to the Honors
Program: Mission, Goals and Requirements; Curriculum; Thesis; Administrative Structure;
Facilities; Financial Report; Living Learning Communities; Recruitment and Admissions; Study
Abroad; Academic Advising; and Assessment. We will also include an extensive appendix of
additional, relevant material, as listed below.
2007 External Review: We will include a report of our last external review, as well as a
document responding to the suggestions from the report, indicating what we have and have not
done in the intervening years, with descriptions and explanations for each.
University Strategic Plan
Honors 5-Year Plan
Annual Reports from the Honors Program since 2007
Student Senior Survey Data
Semi-Annual Reports from the Honors Fellows Community Director since its start in 2013
Honors Course Syllabi
Honors Teaching Workshop Outline
We also imagine an itinerary that would have 1 external reviewer at Elon for 2 full days (arriving on, for
example, Monday evening, reviewing our program Tuesday and Wednesday, and flying back out
Wednesday evening). We imagine the itinerary including observing two Honors courses and meeting
with the following people and groups (note: some of the meetings could occur over meals (such as with
the Directors and the Honors Advisory Council):
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Director 2013-Today: Tom Mould
Associate Director 2008-Today: Mike Carignan
Associate Directors for 2015-2019: Lucinda Austin and Barbara Miller
Recent Past Directors: Maureen Vandermaas-Peeler, Mary Jo Festle
Members of the Honors Advisory Council
Honors Teaching Faculty
Thesis Mentors of Honors Fellows
Honors Students
Faculty Advisors to the Living Learning Communities
Honors Fellows Community Director
President Leo Lambert
Provost Steven House
Associate Provost Tim Peeples
Director for the Center of the Advancement of Teaching and Learning: Deandra Little
Dean of Admissions Lisa Keegan and Vice President of Admissions and Financial Planning, Greg
Zaiser
Vice President for University Advancement Jim Piatt
Thank you for considering our application. If you have any questions, or need any additional materials
from us, please do not hesitate to contact us via phone or email: Director Tom Mould, Email:
tmould@elon.edu, Phone: 336-278-5746 or Associate Director Mike Carignan, email:
mcarignan@elon.edu, phone: 336-278-5744.