Interested in joining the Honors Program?
Mission, Honors Values, and Program Goals
Mission
Arcadia Honors is a place where students with many talents and passions are encouraged to feed their strengths, refine them, and then own them. The program grows in the direction of our values, passions, and talents. Students are encouraged to take the best of themselves to make positive impacts on innovative, strategic, and empathetic teams and also recognize the pathway to their own happiness.
Honors Values
- Empathy: Make understanding others a priority.
- Collaboration: Play well with others; there is strength in teams.
- Innovation: Problems are just opportunities waiting to be explored.
- Integrity: Be who you say you are.
- Passions: Follow them.
- Communication: Voices heard and understood create a difference.
- Connection: Every connection is an opportunity for greater happiness.
- Inclusivity: Everyone has a special place within the community; explore yours and use it to change the community for the better.
- Diversity: Living lives where differences are celebrated as a valued asset.
- Shared vulnerability: Being willing to take risks, learn from setbacks and most of all, ask for and give help. In shared vulnerability real connections occur and trust is built.
Program Goals
- Establish a community of Honors Students that fosters scholarly pursuits and leadership.
- Provide Honors courses that are academically inviting and challenging while encouraging students’ talents and broadening their knowledge base.
- Provide specialized opportunities to be mentored and be a mentor.
- Provide a curriculum that requires deep introspection of individual talents, values, and means of contributing to a team to create positive change.
- Provide opportunities beyond normal campus activities to expand and encourage cultural, scientific and artistic appreciation.
- Encourage Honors Students to actively participate in campus activities, assume leadership roles, and create new campus programs and events.
- Involve Honors Students actively in the Honors Program through the Honors Council and by initiating Honors projects.
- Provide access to and mentorship through scholarship applications.
Courses that focus on teams, passions, and creating impact
Just because you are smart doesn't mean you should read longer books and write longer papers. We know you are smart, what are you going to do with that gift? In our honors program the courses aren’t more work, they are a different kind of work. Teamwork! We aid you in developing the use of your strengths to make things happen.
The Honors Community
We Are A Community of Learners, Doers and Emerging Professionals. All Honors students have an extra advisor and mentor, Helene Klein. Learn more about Klein’s mentorships.
Certificate in Teamwork and Leadership Development
You can earn a Certificate in Teamwork and Leadership Development. Students will finish all the academic requirements of the Honors Program (Honors Equilibrium, The Study of Self and Teams, Honors Project and three (3) upper level seminars – or two seminars and an adaptation along with two high impact practices will be awarded a Certificate in Leadership Development and Teawork.
*2021-22 academic year.
**Based on data collect over four years, the odds of teamwork, leadership, motivation and other related skills remaining the same after a student completes an Honors class. (Our students grow!)
Outcomes for Students in the Honors Program
Enjoying Program Benefits
At Arcadia University, Honors Students enjoy many valuable benefits inside and outside of the classroom.
Arcadia University Honors Program includes many academic privileges, including:
- Priority registration for classes
- Permission to take up to 20 credits per semester after your first semester at Arcadia
- Backpacks to Briefcases (an Honors Professionalism Series)
- Internship Opportunities through The Compass and College Access Mentoring Program
- Specialized Leadership Programming and Mentorship Opportunities
Additionally, Honors Students enjoy many other valuable benefits inside and outside of the classroom.
- Access to The Hive.
- Off-campus excursions to enriching venues, premier museums, and restaurants.
- Camaraderie through social get-togethers as you plan for future events, share overseas experiences, and celebrate special occasions.
- Organize campus and community service events.
- Network with leaders from the wider community.
- Act as campus leaders on the Honors Executive Board (Council).
- Participate in service learning projects organized by Honors students. For example: creating political debates to increase student engagement, creating living legacy trees with neighboring nursing homes, developing college readiness with at-risk youth organizations, and creating libraries for local homeless shelters.
Honors PROJECTions '25-'22
You're not one thing; you're anything you want to be. So, for your Honors Project, we ask you do to something outside your major—a passion project. What will you do? Sky's the limit! See examples from '25- '22 below.
Honors PROJECTions '21-'19
We know with the proper support and resources, you can accomplish anything you want. We are so proud of the amazing array of Honors Projects that you will find listed here. See examples from '21- '19 below.
The Honors Program Experience
When I first came to Arcadia, I didn’t know my way. I had no idea what to expect or how to feel, but I truly found a home in the Honors program.
