<p>Can anyone tell me what the differences are between the traditional route and the Honor’s Program?</p>
<p>What are the Pros and cons?
What’s the point of doing Honor’s program?</p>
<p>Emory does not have a university-wide honors program, college, or courses like many public institutions. Rather, students graduate with honors by writing an acceptable honors thesis in their major department (one, if the student has more than one department). It is important to note that while the College mandates a 3.5 GPA to write a thesis and graduate with honors, it is the department’s prerogative to select students to support in writing a thesis. In many popular departments (e.g., economics, political science), the honors program cut off may be 3.75±-and that’s just to be invited to submit a proposal for consideration.</p>
<p>The level of honors (granted here in English: honors, high honors, and highest honors) depends on the quality of the thesis. In some cases, one or both of the two-course, year-long thesis-writing sequence can count toward the major; in other departments, they cannot. Otherwise, completing the honors program is not dissimilar to not doing the honors route.</p>
<p>Pursuing honors is most attractive and helpful for those interested in a non-professional graduate program. Also, note that the school does not grant degrees with honors or distinction based on GPA (other than mandating a 3.5 to participate in the thesis-writing process).</p>
<p>@aigiqinf,
Do you know about the honor program in science departments?
I’ve heard some humanity and business majors writing honor thesis, but i’m not sure about science majors like bio and chem.</p>
<p>If you have a 3.5 or higher GPA you can write a thesis in the sciences [Department</a> of Biology | Emory University](<a href=“http://www.biology.emory.edu/honors]Department”>http://www.biology.emory.edu/honors)</p>
<p>Bernie12 might have more information as I believe he’s currently pursuing a phD in biology. If you want more in depth information, here’s the link to the contact information of the honors coordinators [Contact</a> Information | Honors Program | in Atlanta, Georgia at the Other Department, Emory University](<a href=“http://catalog.college.emory.edu/academic/honors/contact.html]Contact”>http://catalog.college.emory.edu/academic/honors/contact.html) They can better answer your questions.</p>
<p>You guys have it right (except that the description did not include the fact that those in honors must complete grad. level work or in the case of the social sciences, often a grad. level in addition to an additional colloquium or senior seminar beyond the normal requirement). Perhaps this person is referring to something like the Scholars Program, which is honestly no different academically from those who are not scholars other than the fact that scholars get priority when enrolling in courses (and thus typically choose better/more challenging courses and profs. starting as a freshman. More often than not, Scholars use their enrollment times and AP credits to challenge themselves). </p>
<p>liu:All majors pursuing honors must write a thesis. Period (think about it. It often takes less time to get some results for scientific research than to get certifiable evidence supporting a social scientific theory. Science programs will most certainly require a thesis. Now “publishable” results may be a different story). No department awards honors based purely upon GPA. The only exception I can think of is NBB and Neurosci and that is a national award/organization, not departmental honor. The Chemistry department gives awards to outstanding students, but not honors to people w/no thesis (though to get any award higher than the “outstanding achievement in general chemistry”, you must be doing research in the dept. And most winners of upperlevel awards in chemistry are indeed completing a thesis).</p>
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<p>No GPA entitles you to write a thesis. The 3.5 is the minimum requirement set by the College to be eligible, but it is the prerogative of the department to select students. They could select every student interested who meets this requirement, or even none of them.</p>
<p>Actually, the College does not require a graduate course to complete the honors program, though such a course is commonly required (“Requirements vary slightly from department to department. They generally include enrollment in a graduate seminar or graduate course, completion of a research project or paper that is the equivalent of a BA or BS thesis, and additional supervised reading or enrollment in a special honors course”). IDS, for example, does not require a graduate course.</p>
<p>I know the college doesn’t require it, but most depts do require it, assuming the graduate course offerings are robust enough. And yes, some depts do indeed increase cutoffs for honors (such as econ. and polisci. Econ. selects among students w/3.5+, and I believe polisci requires a 3.75. I’m sure these depts. know that there are either lots of easy courses or abundant grade inflation throughout the courses).</p>
<p>What if you got a 0.0 one semester in your freshman year and then six semesters of 4.0? Your GPA would be 3.429, but haven’t you still shown that you’re way, way more than that?</p>
<p>They can make exceptions (I think the honors program link on most dept. websites mention this fact in passing). It’s at the discretion of the dept. members.</p>