A very important characteristic of one who wishes to be considered intelligent and cultured is the love of travel. According to the National Collegiate honors Council, a fully developed Honors Program, and subsequently Honors Colleges, should "emphasize the participatory nature of the Honors educational process by adopting such measures as offering opportunities for students to participate in regional and national conferences, Honors semesters, international programs, community service, and other types of experiential education." To my knowledge, the Honors College at Southern Arkansas University does little of this.
It is true that the Honors College does enough to barely meet the criteria by planning scattered trips to places such as the Clinton Library in Little Rock, Arkansas and NASA in Houston, Texas, but I believe that only scrapes the surface of what is meant by this criterion. Generally, these trips would fall under the "other types of experiential education" category, the "miscellaneous" category, the "if you don't do anything else make sure you do this" category. And this simply is not fair. Not once have I heard of an opportunity to participate in any sort of Honors related conference. Quite frankly, I was not aware of their existence. I am not sure of what exactly an Honors semester is, and I can assure you I have never been offered the chance to travel to of the country with the Honors College for any purpose whatsoever. In fact, none of these points are even mentioned on the Southern Arkansas University Honor's College report card. It's no wonder they are not put into practice.
The easiest place to start would be with community service. Southern Arkansas University just so happens to be situated in the heart of the community often known as Magnolia, Arkansas. I am positive that Magnolia, Arkansas would not mind being "serviced" in any way, from cleaning up the neighborhood to talking to local school-aged children about college, specifically Honors College. As funds increase, trips to different countries for international study could easily be worked into the curriculum. The Honors College could charge the students a portion of the price to make the trip optional yet affordable. With further research, Honors semesters and conferences could work their way into the Honors College at Southern Arkansas University.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment