Honors
Honors
Meetings, Examinations, and Procedures
Each honors student will work with the advisor and two additional readers, who will be chosen by the advisor in conjunction with the student. In late October, all English faculty and all Honors candidates will meet to hear each candidate speak briefly about a three-page thesis prospectus that will have been distributed prior to the meeting. Members of the department will respond with suggestions for ways of improving or sharpening the student's approach to the subject. Advisors will meet with students after the colloquium to discuss the department's suggestions, and in the remaining months of the semester the student will revise the project accordingly and begin drafting the thesis.
The student should submit draft portions of the project to the advisor and additional readers when they are available, ideally beginning in the early weeks of the spring semester, but no later than one week before spring vacation begins, when a rough draft of the project is due. Final versions are due approximately ten days before the last day of classes for spring semester.
The student will then defend the thesis in an oral examination with the department, to be held soon after the last day of classes. (An announcement giving the specific due date for the final project and a schedule for the oral exam will be mailed to each candidate early in April.) After the oral examination, the candidate will receive an oral summary of the department's evaluation from his or her project director. The supervising instructor, with advice from the additional readers, will assign the final grade for Honors. The English department awards only one level of Honors. Honors will be decided in each case after the oral exam.