OATdb Archive

2012 - 2013

Honors College

Goal
Attracting And Retaining Excellent Students
The Honors Program should continuously examine its approaches to attracting and retaining high-quality students.

Objective
Streamline Admissions Review Without Compromising The Process
Our initiatives to attract more honors students without changing admissions standards paid off handsomely, with significant increases in applications, especially from current SHSU students.  However, this increase overloaded the admissions committees. A main objective for 2012-2013 is to find ways to streamline admissions process without compromising the integrity of the review system.


KPI
Reduction In Admissions Committee Workload (without Reduction In Quality)
Given the huge increase in numbers of Honors College applications (from 257 in fall 2011 to 325 in fall 2012), and anticipating similar numbers for 2013, we will attempt structural changes to reduce the admission committee workload, without at the same time compromising the process or reducing the quality of the reviews.  The target of this structural revision will be a 25% reduction of admissions review per committee.

Result
Achievement Of The Desired Result
The goal of 25% reduction in cases per committee member was achieved; however, it was not necessarily for the reasons expected.  The new procedures did significantly streamline the process.  The average number of cases per committee member dropped more than 20%, but the drop was partially due to an unexpected drop in the number of applicants (from 325 for fall 2013 to 271 (as of June 30, 2013).  However, despite changes in the committees (retirement of past members and the addition of three completely new members), the process has worked very well.  The backlog at this point last summer was 25.  As of the middle of July 2013, we have only three applications yet to be reviewed.  While the measurement of quality will be an ongoing effort, the percentage of acceptance has not changed dramatically (a few percentage points higher than the average over the past several years).  Preliminarily, despite the lower number of applicants, the objective seems to have been reached.

Action
Preliminary Assessment And Continued Review Of Admissions Process
The action we will take, beginning this coming fall, is put into place more definitive measurements, such as first-to-second year retention and levels of participation. It will not be until the spring of 2017, when most of the fall 2013 class graduates, that we will be collecting definitive data through exit surveys and honors graduation rates. Based on preliminary evidence (and the clearly more humane process for our admissions committees), we will continue our revised admissions review procedures.While we achieved our goal principally through unanticipated means (reduction in applications), the experiment in revising the application process is promising. 


Goal
Enhance The Overall Honors Educational Experience
The honors program should strive to provide avenues for academic and scholarly fulfillment both within and beyond the honors curriculum

Objective
Expand And Enhance Honors Involvement In Undergraduate Research
In order to grow its role as an educational leader on campus and to assume the responsibilities of becoming a college, the Honors College should strive to expand research opportunities and support for honors students as well as to become the center for undergraduate research at the university, both within and beyond the Honors College.

Our criteria will be to establish a baseline of three significant improvements to the previous year’s Symposium experience and a significant uptick in positive post-Symposium evaluations. The problems we targeted were (1) late planning and startup, (2) less than satisfactory early involvement from students and faculty, and (3) the need for enhanced participation incentives and rewards.

KPI
Continued Improvement Of The Undergraduate Research Symposium
The Undergraduate Research Symposium has become the event centerpiece of undergraduate research at the university. The number of presenters, attendees, and faculty moderators is now holding steady, so we turned our attention away from those numbers and toward enhancing the symposium experience for presenters, faculty moderators, and audience members. During and after last year's symposium, several quality-of-experience issues arose, and we began planning early to address and remedy those problems with the intent of further enhancing the URS experience for all involved.

Our chief method of measuring the success of our initiatives will be (1) post-Symposium surveys filled out by participants, moderators, and presenters and (2) post-Symposium assessment and planning meetings among the Symposium Director and the student committee.

Result
Successful Addressing Of Identified Deficiencies
In order to address the three identified issues, we (1) established better working committees and launched a reassessment and pre-planning effort in the summer and fall of 2012, (2) initiated a series of spring informational meetings for faculty and prospective student presenters, and (3) initiated new improvements designed to enhance the symposium and raise the incentives for superior participation.  Some of the enhancements of part 3 were made possible by a continuation grant from Student Services, and we pursued and landed a $2,500 grant from Target Corporation.  In addition, we added three outstanding presentation awards--one award from the Honors College and two Assam Awards sponsored by an SHSU faculty member.

Action
Successful Outcomes And Addressing Further Issues
Based on the post-symposium surveys (see attached evaluation summary and graph), as well and verbal remarks and a followup assessment meeting, we accomplished our three main objectives.  We have, based on the same inputs, identified other, less serious issues that will need our attention going forward.  Due to this calculated attention and the diligence of our student and faculty committee members and staff, the URS has become one of the very best undergraduate events at the university.  It was so successful this year that we will be delivering a presentation on the Undergraduate Research Symposium at the 2013 National Collegiate Honors Council meeting in New Orleans.

Objective
Clarify Honors Requirements And Expectations
With the growth of the Honors College our ability to disseminate information efficiently to Honors students has come under real strain.  Our objective is to launch several initiatives to combat this failure of information.  

We have been alarmed to discover fairly significant numbers of students laboring under misconceptions about Honors policies, procedures, and practices. This seriously inhibits our students’ opportunities to complete a productive Honors experience. We must take measures to combat misinformation which in some cases diminishes (or confuses) the Honors experience and in worse cases interferes with the completion of the requirements.

KPI
Enhance And Improve Efforts To Share Information With Students
The first measurement of our success will be to produce a substantial number of clarifying documents to honors students.  The second indicator will be a reduction in the number of questions about the policies, practices, and procedures covered in these documents


Result
Documentation Of Increased Communication Efforts
As a result of planning and sharing sessions and specifically identifying staff and student workers with skills appropriate to producing various types of communications, we substantially improved our sharing of information with honors students.  Among the documents and communications we produced or improved on are (1) instructions for applying for Honors Ambassadorships, (2) a clearer and better-distributed Honors calendar, (3) a more student-centered approach to the Honors College newsletter, (4) clearer and more comprehensive instructions for performing and documenting community service, and (5) a document designed to help new students get a handle on how to "get started in Honors"--in addition to a variety of other documents and publications.  We will continue to track the effect of these efforts, but experience and anecdote tell us that we are having fewer questions about honors and fewer confused students.


Action
Initiatives For Building On The Success Of 2012-13
The principle sources of information for students are published honors guidelines and information areas on the honors website. We have worked steadily throughout the year to ensure that honors prospects and students are getting clear and useful information. We have also worked closely with university public relations to dramatize and clarify our recruitment documents. This year has represented a substantial uptick in the efficiency and effectiveness of our communication with prospective and current students.  However, knowing that we can do better, we have already begun planning for enhancing the efficiency and effectiveness of our communications.  We are in the process of budget planning to meet the increased costs of upgraded communications, and we have already begun scheduling staff and student workers for workshops in media design and presentation. 


Update to previous cycle's plan for continuous improvement Our 2012-13 findings are largely positive.  We have registered gains and improvements in all the identified initiative areas.  In fact, while there is always room for improvement, the Undergraduate Research Symposium has reached such a high state of success that we will be merely monitoring it for necessary refinements.  (It is trus that, our successes have led us to consider an entirely different model--that is, opening it up to students from other universities.  That is an initiative that may become part of our 2013-14--or later--planning.)  Our assessment and resulting plan for improvement of the admissions process leads us to begin planning for ways to anticipate unanticipated growth spurts.  On the other front--"enhancing and improving the sharing of information with students--we think the new initiatives outlined above have cused improvements in this area, but we do not yet have data to support our assumptions.  Going forward into 2013-14, we will establish measurements of the effectiveness of our communication efforts.

While the changes we made in the admissions process promise to handle any future increases in admissions, our plan for improvement includes such initiatives as working with the Enrollment Management Division to better predict rates of applications, thereby giving us the opportunity to anticipate these spurts and shift our staff work load to address them proactively.  

Going forward into the 2013-14 planning year, we are anticipating and planning for problems in han space and funding, in honors course offerings, and simply keeping close-enough personal touch with our students. To this last point, the Honors College staff is essentially equal to what pertained in 2005, when the Honors Program membership stood at less than 200. Going forward, and based on what we have learned in 2012-13 about communications issues and problems with processing the increased number of applications, we will be requesting both more space and an increase in student workers (or a graduate assistant). A more significant issue is the inability of the Bowers Endowment to keep pace with growth in the College. In the spring of 2013, the Bowers Scholarship fund fell significantly short of the amount needed to perform a full distribution of honors scholarships, and we are planning ways to either (1) build that endowment or (2) discover other sources or scholarship funding. In most areas, we have managed to accommodate this growth by cutting back on some annual events (student recognition receptions, for instance) and by refocusing some of our administrative procedures and reconfiguring our daily workflow. However, our planning for 2013-14 must address these issues more specifically.
 
For AY 2012, we identified three main objectives: promoting higher Honors awareness on campus, expanding and enhancing Honors involvement in undergraduate research, and revising administrative procedures to increase the efficiency of our operation and to clarify Honors requirements and expectations. We have been largely successful in each of these objectives. Various promotions and publications campaigns, combined with revised approaches to our formal recruiting events, such as the Student Appreciation Dinner and the “Let’s Talk” event, have increased our visibility on and off campus, resulting in, for instance, a record 55 applications from current SHSU students, including record numbers of Hispanic and African-American applicants. The Undergraduate Research Symposium has—over the past three academic years—fully established the Honors College as a leader (perhaps the leader) in undergraduate research on campus. The most important improvement in Honors College efficiency was the revision of the application committee review process, but we also revised and clarified several informational and procedural documents, such as the policies and procedures for the honors thesis. 

In other words, we are pleased with our progress on the 2012-13 plan, but we continue to monitor those issues in hopes that we can, indeed, make continuous improvements.  Meanwhile, we have already identified several areas that are in apparent need of improvement in 2013-14.

Plan for continuous improvement Plan for Continuous Improvement (based on what was learned from the 2012-2013 Cycle Findings,  plus other identified initiatives)

Our efforts in these aforementioned objectives have given rise to other, related initiatives.  These are included in our plan for continued improvement for 2013-14.

Goals and Initiatives for 2013-14

  1.  Improve on the quality of the honors educational experience without compromising quality
    1. Increase the number and disciplines of upper-division and core-curriculum honors courses
    2. Add honors tracks in other areas, such as Allied Health and Nursing
    3. Explore the addition of honors faculty
    4. Improve on the Honors College physical facility and staffing
      1. Seek expanded space for offices, storage, meeting facilities,  and student use
      2. If additional space becomes available, seek additional Honors College staff, such as a full-time advisor or additional secretary
      3. Seek a better and more permanent solution to Honors College student housing
      4. Improve on current recruitment and retention
        1. Add personnel capable of taking on an advising load
        2. Work with the Admissions Office and Institutional Effectiveness to produce improved prospects listings
        3. Correct identified fiscal and budget deficiencies
          1. Find new funding for the Bowers Scholarships and/or the Bowers Endowment
          2. Develop a stipend plan for faculty supervising honors theses
          3. Work with the Alumni Office to develop a contribution stream from Honors alumni
          4. Expand the presence and impact of the Undergraduate Research Symposium
            1. Study the possibility of involving the Woodlands Center and creating connections with Lone Star College
            2. Study the long-term possibility of opening the URS to students from other universities
            3. Seek additional funding for further presentation awards
 

Sam Houston State University | A Member of The Texas State University System