HONORS COLLEGE COMMUNIQUE: January 2024

Hello and Happy New Year from the Honors College! In partnership with Academic Advising, we are sending a monthly Honors College Communique on the Advising listserv, in which we will send short updates about:     

1. Honors opportunities open to all students   

2. A highlighted benefit of being an Honors College member   

3. A student highlight from your advising areas   

4. Contacts within Honors for more information   

Honors News:

Honors welcomes a new staff member to the college, Renee Higgins! Renee has joined us as Senior Administration Manager. In her role, she will support the Vice Provost for Honors, Dr. Jill Fleuriet, manage staff and leadership team meetings, and be the point of contact for Honors College scholarships. She will also assist our Fiscal Manager with specific budget projects.

Renee has a Master of Public Administration from St. Mary’s University and a B.A. in Applied Arts and Sciences from the School of Community Service at UNT-Denton. She has a social media certification from the University of the Incarnate Word and the San Antonio Area Foundation. Renee has extensive knowledge of higher education and working with students.  Most recently, she served s as a Senior Advisor and Enrollment Coach at Alamo Colleges and worked for several years at St. Mary’s University as the business manager for the Law School and its journal. She has also worked as a scholarship coordinator for Bexar County foster youth transitioning out of the system. and as a writer for the Texas Music Educators Conference and the Associate of America Kodaly Educators.

Honors Academics:

We receive lots of questions regarding Honors requirements. Below is an example of what we provide our students, regarding the Honors curriculum requirements. Have questions? Contact the Honors Counselors at honors.advising@utsa.edu.

Welcome to UTSA & the Honors College! The required courses are below. You'll need to take HON 1000 first. It's required in the first semester since it's the intro to Honors and will explain the curriculum + help you discover your path in Honors. As for the experiences, those can be done inside or outside the classroom (which is what HON 1000 covers). More information about it is on our website .

• HON 1000 – is required for all Honors students and must be taken in the first semester. This is a zero-credit hour, 8-week, online, asynchronous course.
• HON 2301 – is required for Honors and must be taken in the first year. This is a one-credit hour, 8-week, online, asynchronous course.
• Honors CSH 1213– is required for Honors and can be taken when it fits your schedule. This course is offered in the fall or spring semester. This is a core course and the modality is listed on the course schedule. Each section has a different topic, and you can read the topic title + course descriptions on our website .
• Honors WRC 1023 – is required, unless you have prior credit (ex: dual credit for ENGL 1302). This is a core course, and the modality is listed on the course schedule. NOTE: If you have credit already for this, you do NOT need to take the Honors section.

Notes:

• Honors AIS is not required, however if you take it, it will count towards the core curriculum and as your first Honors experience.
• You can find Honors sections of courses by selecting "Honors" in the attribute box on the course schedule.

· Most HON seminar courses are interdisciplinary and open to all Honors students. There are a few that require instructor permission. Course descriptions & requirements can be found on the website.

Honors Opportunities for All Students:

The Archer Fellowship Program provides undergraduate students from across The University of Texas System with a unique opportunity to explore their interest in public policy and/or public service in our nation’s capital.

Why Archer?

• Thanks to generous campus support, tuition and housing fees are fully covered for UTSA Archer Fellows!
• All majors are welcome!
• Earn in-residence UT San Antonio credit for coursework and gain hand-on work experience in a full-time internship of your choosing.
• Archer Fellows live together near Capitol Hill and build lasting friendships and professional connections with each other.
• Honors College students earn 3 Honors Experiences when completing the Fellowship.

Eligibility - The Archer Fellowship Program is available to undergraduate students of all majors and areas of study, and we welcome a diverse array of student interests and backgrounds. Students do not need to be members of the Honors College to be a part of the Archer Fellowship.

Students must meet the following eligibility requirements in order to apply:

• Cumulative GPA of 3.0 or greater at The University of Texas at San Antonio
• Previous work or internship experience
• Campus involvement and/or community leadership experience
• Applicant must be pursuing a University of Texas System bachelor’s degree

If selected for the Archer Fellowship Program, students must meet the following requirements by the beginning of the semester they will be in Washington, D.C.:

• Junior or senior status by years and hours (first and second-year students are not eligible)
• Twenty-four hours of in-residence credit completed at The University of Texas at San Antonio
• Completion of political science core curriculum requirements (POL 1013 and either POL 1133 or POL 1213 or their equivalents)

The Archer Fellowship application is due Feb. 15^th.

Questions? Contact Campus Coordinator Kristi Meyer at Kristi.Meyer@utsa.edu.

Highlighted Benefit for Honors College Members:

Honors College partners with many programs on campus, and activities done within those programs count towards Honors experiences! Honors has a unique curriculum where experience credit can be earned through in-class & outside the classroom activities.

• In class activities: HON courses, Honors sections of courses, Honors contracts, independent studies, research courses, internship courses, study abroad and more!
• Note: not all courses have the H-grade mode or HNRS restriction. What does that mean? It means we have special attributes we put on courses so it does not restrict non-Honors students from taking the courses, but it pulls it into the student’s DegreeWorks to count as an experience (ex: MUS 3801, SOSA).
• Outside the classroom activities: these can be any extracurricular activities that include professional, academic, personal, or social activities. Some examples can be: certifications, internships, study abroad, special projects, volunteering/service, being a part of a student organization/intramural team/student athlete, writing/publishing, presenting at a conference, learning a new skill, doing activities that promote wellbeing or work-life balance, etc.
• Note: these activities are tied to zero-credit hour SPICES courses. Once a student completes the activity, they submit a form and get enrolled in a zero-credit HON course that represents the type of experience they completed. Find out more about the SPICES courses here. These courses do not impact the degree or graduation in any way! They are free, applied to the Honors block in DW, and students receive automatic credit at the end of term for them.

Not only do we offer credit for students engaging in these activities, we provide support in finding, applying & paying for these experiences! We also have means of teaching them how to speak about their experiences, in meaningful ways – the Experiential Learning Fair being one of them!

Student Highlight: Anastasiia Gordeeva, Sophomore, major in Chemistry in the College of Science, with a minor in Neuroscience

• International student from Russia
• Holds a music degree and is a piano music composer
• Multilingual (4): Russian, English, French and German
• Internship Summer 2024 at Hackensack Meridian Health, New Jersey. Mass Spectrometry research in Dr. Claire Carter’s pediatric neuro-oncology laboratory 
• Currently an officer in the Brain Exercise Initiative student organization
• Actively involved in Dr. Stephan B. Bach’s analytical chemistry lab at UTSA, contributing to research on multiple sclerosis
• Former science mentor at the College of Sciences Student Success Center and winner of the College of Sciences Trailblazer Award
• Part of the MARC-2 Pre-PhD Honors Research Training Program
• Publications: Published in INQUIRIES Journal. Propaganda, Patriotism, and Perseverance: How Music Became an Instrument for the US War Effort During the Second World War. INQUIRIES Journal, Vol. 13 No. 11 (2021).
• Future plans: researcher and business owner, wants to establish a worldwide Neurochemistry Research and Rehabilitation Center

Best Regards,   

Alegra Lozano, Director of Counseling, Honors College, alegra.lozano@utsa.edu

Hector Aguilar, Associate Dean, Honors College, hector.aguilar@utsa.edu

Honors email: honors@utsa.edu

Honors advising email: honors.advising@utsa.edu

Honors website: https://honors.utsa.edu/

Honors Experiential Learning Lab: https://honors.utsa.edu/academics/experiential-learning-lab.html