Honors Project Seminars

Our interdisciplinary seminars are the unique driving core of the Honors Project experience. These seminars are two units, meet once a week, and are to be paired with a transfer course (the “foundation” course) the student is concurrently taking. The seminars are UC transferable as a "variable topic" course, which means they do not automatically transfer, but can be petitioned for transfer by the student, after arriving at a UC campus.

Offered through the department of Interdisciplinary Studies (IDST), we have two humanities/social sciences-oriented seminars, and two math/sciences-oriented seminars:

The seminar supports each student’s process of developing and executing an advanced research project for the foundation course the student is taking. So, the seminar is interdisciplinary in two ways: students in the seminar are each working on different subjects (e.g., biology, astronomy, physics, etc.); and, the seminar instructor guides students in how to incorporate an interdisciplinary approach to their research. The seminars are intensive, collaborative and rewarding. Students receive input from the seminar instructor, their foundation course instructor, and each other.

Note: the advanced research project developed and executed in the seminar will, if completed successfully, earn the student honors credit for the foundation course. But this research project is an assignment distinct from and in addition to all assignments in the foundation course.

The difference between seminars 1 and 2: students first take seminar 1, ideally in the area they are more interested in (humanities, or sciences); then, later, they can take seminar 2 in the same area, where the student has more advanced assignments involving mentoring first-time students.

Note: We have found that for many foundation courses (in particular mathematics, technology and the sciences), students need to have completed the entire course before they can produce a rich, deep, high quality seminar project As such, we have adapted the model to allow certain students enrolled in the honors seminar, with pre-approval, to use a foundation course and instructor from the previous semester.

Upon successful completion of the seminar project, the student earns honors credit for the foundation course and the seminar, on the transcript.