Calendar of Events
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Please check our online Calendar of Events for the latest news.
June 25
St. Louis Faculty Institute Registration Deadline
June 30
Honors Newsletter Contest Deadline
July 1
Pre-Conference Program Available Online
Conference Hotel Registration Opens
Student Moderator Applications Due
July 9 - 11
New Directors Summer Camp
July 15
Partners in the Parks:
Acadia Experience Registration Deadline
August 5 - 8
St. Louis Faculty Institute
August 8 - 14
Partners in the Parks
Acadia Experience
September 1
JNCHC Article Deadline
September 25
Conference Title Request Deadline
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Future Years: Membership Renewal
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Remember, you now have the option of selecting the year for which you
wish to make payment. Both the membership form and the
invoice on our website offers institutions and professionals the
opportunity to pre-pay membership dues in a manner that is convenient
for their budget and fiscal year.
This option is intended to be a convenience for those lucky
individuals or institutions with funds left at the end of the year who want to
get a jump on future expenses. Our
new NCHC membership software allows us to track institutional and individual
memberships for as many years in the future as needed and will avoid duplicate
memberships.
If you have any questions, need assistance, or have
suggestions to offer, please don't hesitate to contact Carolee Martin Brink, NCHC Membership
Director, at 402-472-9150 or by email at nchc@unlserve.unl.edu.
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Amazon Link
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Remember that
you can support NCHC while you do your shopping. Simply click the Amazon link at http://www.nchchonors.org/ and a percentage of your purchase will go to help support the mission of NCHC,
at absolutely no cost to you!
What can you buy at Amazon.com? Books, movies, music, clothes,
electronics, toys, musical instruments, kitchen sinks, cat and dog food,
espresso machines, text books, jewelry, even groceries. In fact, you can
find just about anything on Amazon.com and help support NCHC at the same time.
Purchases made through Amazon.com are subject to their policies and
procedures. Order fulfillment and customer service are the sole
responsibility of Amazon.com.
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NCHC Trivia
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What is the furthest home from
which a student has come to participate in an Honors Semester?
A)
Flagstaff, Arizona
B)
Stockholm, Sweden
C)
Fairbanks, Alaska
D)
Orono, Maine
E)
San Juan, Puerto Rico
(answer below)
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Conference 2009 Update
"Sumer Is Icumen In," as the enduring Middle English folk round reminds
us. June marks the beginning of summer, and you can be sure that
planning for our annual fall conference in Washington, D.C. continues
at a steady pace. Our dates are 28 Oct. - 1 Nov. 2009, and our planning
committee, conference chair and President-Elect John Zubizarreta, and
national
office staff are working diligently to post a preliminary online
program by 1 July. Look for the program on the NCHC web site at http://www.nchchonors.org. If you are a scheduled presenter, please review the program carefully for any necessary corrections and email them to jzubizarreta@columbiasc.edu
and psouliere2@unl.edu.
The challenges of dealing with a full calendar have been daunting. One
hurdle has involved trying to keep presentations requesting A/V
equipment in confined spaces on one day in order not to decimate our
budget (LCD projectors, for example, rent for about $1000, and with
close to 200 demands for technology, we need to consolidate as much as
possible). If you are wondering how most of your registration fee is
being used, consider your own or
your colleagues' and students' requirements for PowerPoint and the $95
per gallon cost of coffee at hotel catering prices! Trying to fit over
300 presentations into fewer than 170 slots has been, well,
interesting! All this is to say that we will very likely not be able to
make changes in session days or times to accommodate personal
preferences. Please make your travel plans accordingly to take full
advantage of our conference.
Here are some highlights. Wednesday will feature an expanded and refreshed Beginning in HonorsTM workshop led by veterans Ted Estess and Sam Schuman. Thursday is Developing in HonorsTM, City as TextTM
and Master Classes day, with an opening plenary address by Dr. Freeman
Hrabowski III, President of the University of Maryland-Baltimore
County. Friday and Saturday include General Session presentations,
Roundtables, Student Interdisciplinary Research Panels, Portz Scholar
papers, Best Honors Administrative Practices (BHAP) sessions,
Consultants Center, Global Fair, Posters, and more. Additional plenary
events consist of a special viewing of the acclaimed documentary film
"The Linguists," with subsequent conversations with producers and field
researchers, and the distinguished John Murray's moderated panel of key
diplomatic negotiators in the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian-U.S.
situation. Our young tradition of a Silent Auction to benefit a local
charitable organization will take place on Thursday evening (led this
year by students of St. Mary's College of Maryland), along with an
Opening Reception. Friday night's "gala" event is reserved for the
hilarious Capitol Steps performance. Finally, Sunday morning is slated
for an exciting, intensive workshop on honors and technology.
The 1 July target for our draft online program is also the opening date
for making hotel reservations. Our meeting will take place in the
glorious Grand Hyatt Washington, 1000 H Street NW, just five blocks to
the National Mall and Smithsonian Museums, along with all the iconic
monuments and other popular attractions nearby. The hotel is connected
through indoor passageways to the Metro Center station, accessible
directly from Reagan International Airport on the Blue Line for $1.35
day rate. High-speed wireless internet access is available in guest
rooms and throughout the hotel for $9.95 per day. Check the
hotel web site at http://grandwashington.hyatt.com or browse hotel information at the conference web site:
http://www.nchchonors.org/2009-conference-hotel.php.
Conference rates range from $199 (single) to $229 (quad), plus applicable taxes and charges. Remember that you will not be able to make hotel reservations at the conference rate until 1 July.
Enjoy the freshness and green of summer. See you in
Washington, D.C. in the crispness of fall.
John Zubizarreta
2009 Conference Chair
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Call for Student Moderators
Honors Directors: If you would like your students to
participate as student moderators for General Sessions at the 2009 NCHC
Conference (Washington, D.C.) and to be included in the printed program, please complete and submit the online application. The students will receive information about their responsibilities and will be
expected to contact the presenters of the sessions to which they have been
assigned.
If you have any questions about the Student Moderators or submitting a candidate, please contact Jack Rhodes at rhodesj@citadel.edu.
Deadline for inclusion in the printed program is July 1, 2009.
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St. Louis Faculty Institute:
Crossroads & Confluence
August 5-8, 2009
Registration Deadline: June 25th, 2009
St. Louis, the gateway city, sits at a historical
crossroads. As settlers traversed the city from east to west, other traffic
moved north and south on the Mississippi River. How have this city and its
surroundings been shaped by the confluence of peoples and ideas moving through it? From Lewis and Clark to
the slave trade, from covered wagons to the Eads Bridge, how has St. Louis
developed into the community that it is today?
Register now to experience St. Louis and the Mississippi
River in a whole new way while learning how to adapt the City as Text™ (CAT) pedagogy for use at your own institution.
As
a participant, you will engage in experiential learning through
walkabouts, interviews, mapping
exercises, and a direct experience of the city and the river. Daily
seminars will provide time for reflection, writing, and synthesis after
the explorations. CAT™ experts will help you understand how this
technique can be used in courses ranging from literature to biology, and
adapted for use in student orientation, campus assessments, and faculty
development.
The $475 institute fee covers the cost of Institute materials, activity
fees, opening reception, a group dinner, and a non-refundable $50
registration fee. It does not cover travel to St. Louis, transportation
to and from the airport, lodging, most meals, or personal expenses.
Register online and pay by credit card or
complete the registration form included in the brochure.
Note: the registration deadline has been extended to June 25th.
Questions? Contact Bernice Braid at braid@liu.edu or
by phone at
718-488-1329.
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President's Column
Your Board of Directors met this past June 12- 14, 2009;
you can be assured that your Board carefully addressed the business of
NCHC. Please continue watching for the details of registration
and hotel reservations for your conference in Washington, D.C October
28- Nov
1, 2009.
Your Board approved the slate of nominees for officers
and Board of Directors from the Nominating Committee. You will be able to view
the nominees elsewhere in the E-Letter. You will have the opportunity to make
nominations from the floor during the business meeting held on Saturday during
the conference.
Now, the time is here for you, if you have not already
done so, to select two standing committees of your choice on which you wish to
serve. If you will click here, you will have the form available with a drop
down menu of the standing committees. According to our Constitution, members
may serve on a maximum of two standing committees; however, you are free to
serve on as many special interest sections and ad hoc committees as you wish.
People often are confused as to when they are serving on committees. The
President-Elect appoints committees and committee chairs in August before the
President-Elect takes office as president during the business meeting at the
conference. Currently, you may be serving on committees that I appointed last
August. The chairs and co-chairs serve a one-year term, but committee members
are appointed in staggering years so that our committees can continue with the
work of NCHC.
Yours in Honors,
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A Statement to the Membership from the Finance Committee
The
NCHC Finance Committee serves as an advisory committee to the Board of
Directors on financial matters involving revenues and expenditures, both short
and long term. Not all members are board members, and the Finance
Committee regularly communicates with the board and officers regarding the
status of the financial reports as well as issues that should be discussed by
the full board and ones which require board action. The Finance Committee
is also charged with hammering out the annual budget, assisted by the national
office staff. The Committee meets in a face to face meeting in early fall to
review budget requests, the previous year's financial sheets, the current
year's financial sheets to date, and from all of this, prepares the budget to
recommend to the board.
The
Committee has always been focused on the future health of the organization and
presents to the board various scenarios that reflect options for the board to
select when finalizing and approving the budget. As members probably
expect, the Finance Committee is prepared to respond to the current and future
economic conditions and has asked the Board for direction in considering the
2010 budget with three possible options: 1.) a flat budget between 2009
and 2010; 2.) a 5% decrease in revenues and expenses; 3.) a 10% decrease in
revenues and expenses. The third option is a draconian plan, but given
the realities of the economy, presents the Board with the hard job of
evaluating services and their delivery for NCHC members.
The
Standing Orders of the NCHC mandate that there be 100% of both operating and
conference expenses held separately as a buffer against dire conditions.
We are faced with a two-fold problem: the declining balance in our
investment accounts and the financial obligations related to conference hotel
contracts for future conferences. These two factors have highlighted the
stark reality of how far the organization has to go before it can meet the
mandate of the standing orders.
Nevertheless,
the Finance Committee members are aware of how much has been accomplished in
the last 5 years since the raise in dues. That raise has truly allowed
NCHC to deliver enhanced membership services as well as provide a "home" office
and a highly efficient and professional staff.
The
members of the Finance Committee will be meeting in Omaha on the weekend of
September 25 to prepare the 2010 budget and, while conscious of the hard work
and decisions in front of us, will continue to propose a budget that maintains
the valuable services that NCHC provides its members at the same time we guard
the fiscal health of NCHC.
~ Gary Bell & Elizabeth Beck, Co-Chairs
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Honors Newsletter Contest
A Call for Entries
Sponsored by
The National Collegiate Honors Council
Publications Board
Deadline for
submissions is June 30, 2009
To
enter the newsletter from your honors program or college, send 4 copies of each
of two issues and 4 copies of a cover letter
containing the following information:
- The category that best
fits who works on your newsletter:
Student Published OR
Faculty/Administrator/Student Published
- Number of honors students
in your program or college
- Number of copies per issue
- Number of issues published
per year
- Total print costs for one
issue
- Estimated time to edit and
lay out one issue
- Individual(s) or
organization actually doing the layout
- The target audience
(honors students only, honors faculty, all faculty, alumni, etc.)
- The purpose of the
newsletter
- The name and title of the
program director
- The name(s) of the
editor(s)
A 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place
award will be given in each category. Winners in the "Faculty/Administrator/Student"
category are ineligible the year immediately after they have won 1st,
2nd, or 3rd place in that category. Newsletters in the
"Student Published" category can submit their newsletters each year despite winning
awards in the prior year. Winners will be announced at the NCHC annual
luncheon in Washington, D.C.
Send your newsletter entries and cover letter by June 30,
2009 to:
Linda Frost, Director
EKU Honors
168 Case Annex
521 Lancaster
Avenue
Richmond, KY
40475
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Call for Titles
2009 Conference
 In
order
to ensure that the widest variety of important and appealing titles is
available at the book table at the NCHC annual conference in
Washington, D.C., organizers are issuing this call for titles.
The conference will feature an array of
excellent and stimulating speakers and other featured events. The
city is at
a world crossroads, with an unexcelled historical, educational, and
architectural heritage as well as a number of extraordinary cultural
amenities. This year's speakers include
Dr. Freeman Hrabowski III, President of the University of
Maryland-Baltimore County,
and the legal scholar John Murray, as well as a performance by the
political
satire group, Capitol Steps. Conference organizers want to ensure
that works dealing with our speakers as well as the
many important and engaging historical and cultural aspects of the city
are
available to faculty and students attending the conference. To be
certain that the widest and most
attractive array of titles is on hand at the meeting, we are asking
members to
submit suggestions for the table. You
may do so by submitting a conference book title request to George Mariz
via a convenient online form no later than September 25.
~George Mariz |
Call for Papers
The next issue of JNCHC (deadline:
September 1, 2009) invites research essays on any topic of interest to the
honors community.
The issue will also include a Forum focused on the theme
"Honors in the Digital Age." We invite essays of roughly a
thousand words that consider this theme in the context of your campus and/or a
national context.
Topics for Forum submissions might include: the
benefits and liabilities of any specific form of digital technology (word and
image processing, the Internet, social networking sites, personal blogs, cell
phones and PDAs, etc.); the ease of plagiarism and other forms of cheating in
the digital age; the joys and travails of tracking in grading papers; new
opportunities and challenges in research; the influence of digital "gizmos" on
the culture of honors; technology as a creator and/or disruptor of community;
technological innovations/ obsolescence and honors program budgets; the effects
of technology on library use; computer security issues; and illegal downloading
of files on honors program computers.
Please contact Ada Long with any questions.
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Candidates for Board of Directors
Nominee for Vice President
Greg Lanier
University of West Florida
I am truly
honored to be nominated to serve the NCHC as Vice President. As I have said many times before, my roots in
Honors run embarrassingly deep-all the way back to the mid 1970s as an
undergraduate at the University of Colorado.
As a graduate student at the University of Michigan, I was fortunate
enough to teach sections of that institution's core Honors Great Books course;
as a member of the Department of English at the University of West Florida, I
was one of the founding faculty of the UWF Honors Program (1989), and I was
named Director of the University Honors Program in 1999. I remember clearly the excitement that my
students and I felt when we attended our first conference: the 1999 NCHC conference
in Orlando, and I've been back every year with students, faculty, staff, and
administrators in tow. I cannot thank NCHC and all the marvelous colleagues I
have met over the years enough for all I have learned at the national
conference, and my three years of service as a member of the NCHC Board of
Directors has only deepened my indebtedness to my friends in Honors. (more)
Nominee for Secretary
 Robert "Bob" Spurrier
Oklahoma State University
Bob
Spurrier is Director of The Honors College and Professor of Political
Science at Oklahoma State University. He originated our annual
"Developing in Honors" workshop and founded NCHC's Satellite Seminar
(now managed by Phi Theta Kappa). He is co-developer of the new "Best
Honors Administrative Practices" series of NCHC conference sessions
that will be part of our Washington conference. The author of numerous
articles in the Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council, Honors in Practice, Forum for Honors, and The National Honors Report,
Bob has presented many national conference sessions on the "nuts and
bolts" of honors administration. He is the co-author of NCHC's Assessing and Evaluating Honors Programs and Honors Colleges: A Practical
Handbook
monograph. In addition, he is the author of books and professional
journal articles on American law and government, and has been
recognized by a variety of awards for his teaching and advising. (more)
Professional Nominees for Board of Directors
 Kyoko Amano
University of Indianapolis
I would be thrilled to serve on the NCHC Board of
Directors. I have served on the University of Indianapolis's Honors College Faculty
Committee since 2004, taught two Honors freshman English courses, and directed two
Honors projects. I have attended the NCHC
annual conferences every year since 2006.
In my capacity as an Honors faculty, I brought UIndy's Honors students
to NCHC conferences and enjoyed the student-centered culture of NCHC.
UIndy Honors College
and I have benefited from the support the NCHC provides for institutions,
faculty, staff, and students in developing Honors colleges, especially when
UIndy's Honors Program became an Honors
College in 2005. UIndy's Honors College has grown tremendously
since then. In 2005, the retention rate
between junior year and graduation with distinction was less than 50%, with an
overall program retention rate of 10%.
Now, the retention of the junior class is 91.6% with an anticipated
retention to graduation of 81%, and the overall retention rate in the Honors College
is 62%. UIndy
Honors College
now offers Harris Manchester College
(Oxford University) Scholarship, has the Honors
Studio for meetings, and provides the Honors & Scholars floor option for
housing. Also, the quality of Honors projects has improved. I would like to join the board to help carry
out the NCHC's mission and advocate academic excellence and social
responsibility. (more)
 Jerry Herron
Irvin D. Reid Honors College
Wayne State University
I am honored to be considered for a position on the National
Collegiate Honors Council Board of Directors. As a faculty member,
administrator and scholar for nearly 30 years, I have never been as proud or
excited to hold a position as the one I hold now: Dean of the Irvin D. Reid
Honors College at Wayne State University in Detroit. I learned the value of the
NCHC at the beginning of my tenure as Honors Director - starting in 2002 - when
I first consulted a new NCHC friend who provided valuable programmatic and
development advice necessary to secure enhanced funding from university
leadership, the funding that would make it possible for our program to grow and
develop. (more)
 Joe King
Radford University
I have been a faculty member in the Department of Psychology
at Radford University since 1981. My background is in Neuroscience (undergrad
in Biology and Grad
School in Psychology) and
for many years I maintained a collaborative research laboratory in which
students were responsible for all the research projects conducted in the lab
and served as co-authors on publications and presentations that came out of our
research. (more)
 Kim Klein
Shippensburg University
I am
seeking a term on the NCHC Board of Directors because I have seen first-hand
the profound impact that Honors education can have on students, faculty,
institutions, and the community. I
believe that NCHC has a unique opportunity and role to play as a leading advocate
for innovation in higher education to meet the global challenges our students,
faculty, and institutions face in the 21st century. (more)
 Steve Kramer
Southwest Minnesota State University
I currently serve as president of the
Upper Midwest Honors Council. I am also
the director of the Honors Program at Southwest Minnesota State University, a
position I have held for seven years. In addition, I will be entering my fourth
year as chair of the Department of Foreign Languages, Humanities and Philosophy
at SMSU. SMSU is a small, public liberal
arts university and a long-time affiliate of the NCHC. I believe that this combination of experience
has prepared me well for addressing the kind of budgetary, planning and
programmatic questions that the Board of Directors faces. (more)
 Elizabeth Latosi-Sawin
Missouri Western State University
I
have now been the Director of the Honors Program at Missouri Western State
University for four years. I wrote proposals for our faculty (two of which were
delivered at the national conference that took place in St. Louis a few years
ago). I participated most recently in the NCHC Faculty Institute in Lincoln,
Nebraska in 2007 and have just edited a booklet of faculty participants'
writings and photos for the group and the Board.
 Larry Levinson
Governors State University
Serving both as a faculty member and as an honors
administrator, I passionately believe that honors programs are a means of
creating an enriched integrative learning community that extends the "great
conversation" of the academy (R.M. Hutchinson) beyond the classroom.
At Governors State University I first served for four years
as the Honors Director of the College of Arts and Sciences. In 1998, I oversaw
the development of a university-wide honors program that stresses interdisciplinary
learning and civic engagement. Ever since then, I have served as the University
Honors Director and Chair of the Faculty Honors Council. Our Honors program has grown to include honors
seminars (whose yearly theme is taken from the NCHC conference), an annual
honors retreat, student participation in regional honors conferences, and a
service learning project. I have served
two terms as the president of the HCIR (Honors Council of the Illinois Region)
where I worked toward expanding its membership and organized three student
research conferences. (more)
 John Loughney
Westfield State College
Beginning with my attendance at the Albuquerque site visitors workshop,
I pursued NCHC Site Visitor accreditation, which was awarded in 2008.
As listed in my footnote, I have also had other roles associated with
honors accreditation.
My interest in being selected for the NCHC Board arises from a sense that I could bring at least six dimensions to such service:
- significant,
decades-long honors teaching, program development, and program
oversight at a public, four-year, comprehensive college
- experience of honors program coordination within the very large,
multi-level (university; four-year; community-college), multi-campus
(27 institutions) state system in Massachusetts
- practical experience from attending and consulting at recent NCHC national conferences
- site-visiting experience, along with various roles involving accreditation on my own campus over the past thirty years
- a history in recent years of involvement with others who either taught or were enrolled at the NCHC Albuquerque workshop
-
a career-long academic specialization in "organizations," pursued
through the humanities, arts, and social sciences, and
interdisciplinary programs (Women's Studies; American Studies; Latin
American Studies, Film Studies, and Ethnic & Multicultural
Studies). (more)
 Jaskiran Mathur
St. Francis College
My name is Jaskiran Mathur, I am the Director of the
Honors Program and Associate Professor of Sociology at St. Francis College in
Brooklyn, New York.
Lydia Lyons was kind enough to appoint me to the
NCHC committees for 'Small Colleges' and 'International Education' last year. Much to my
disappointment, a fractured knee from an accident earlier in October 2008
prevented me from attending the Annual Meeting in San Antonio and deprived me
of an excellent opportunity to meet with numerous NCHC members and office
holders. I am really excited about the October 2009 meeting especially as we
have two proposals accepted, and the venue is close enough to afford a larger
contingent of students and faculty! (more)
Student Nominees for Board of Directors (2-year term)
 Jamie Beko
University of Indianapolis
Hello,
my name is Jamie Beko and I am a junior at the University of
Indianapolis in Indiana. My chosen major is social work with a
concentration in community organizing. One reason I chose to
follow the path of being an honors student is that the honors college
at UIndy has allowed me to take the school's motto of 'Education for
Service' to a much higher degree. I have been able to participate
in many different community service projects. I am also a
Presidential Assistant, Campus Ambassador, and a member of the Social
Work Association; all while volunteering at several Indianapolis
non-profit organizations (i.e Damar Services, Indianapolis Animal Care
and Control, and Second Helpings) and working part-time at a small
non-profit organization that helps the elderly. I am pursuing a
degree in social work because I have a strong passion to continue this
service for my entire life. (more)
 Alex Cler
Eastern Illinois University
Hello everyone! My name is Alex Cler, and I'm a finance major at
Eastern Illinois University. Currently, I am very actively involved in
the honors program at EIU. I am a member of the local Association of
Honors Students and a Presidential Scholar. The latter is geared
towards integrative learning and enriching a student's experience in
honors, college, and life. My integrated learning project is an
internship with SCORE, a small business consulting organization run by
the federal government. (more)
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2009 Board of Directors
President
Lydia Lyons, Hillsborough Community College
President-Elect
John Zubizarreta, Columbia College-South Carolina
Immediate Past President
Hallie Savage, Clarion University of Pennsylvania
Vice President
Bonnie Irwin, Eastern Illinois University
Secretary
Bob Spurrier, Oklahoma State University
Treasurer
Rolland W. Pack, Freed-Hardeman University
Ginny Atkinson, Central Arizona College
*Amanda Bowman, Columbia College-South Carolina
Bernice Braid, Long Island University-Brooklyn
Ellen Buckner, University of Alabama-Birmingham
Elizabeth Callahan, Saint Louis University
*Sarah Fann, University of North Carolina-Wilmington
Annmarie Guzy, University of South Alabama
Greg Lanier, University of West Florida
Kathy Lyon, Winthrop University
Jay Mandt, Wichita State University
*Roxanne Moralez, Texas State University-San Marcos
Rosalie Otero, University of New Mexico
Doug Peterson, University of South Dakota
Jim Ruebel, Ball State University
*Ann Schnitzenbaumer, Ball State University
Rick Scott, University of Central Arkansas
*Pratik Talati, University of Alabama-Birmingham
*Nathan Torno, Texas A & M University
*Student Member
NCHC Staff
Cynthia M. Hill, Executive Director 402-472-9155
Carolee Martin Brink 402-472-9150
Judy Smith 402-472-9150
Trish Souliere 402-472-9172
Betty Talley 402-472-9151
(trivia question answer: Stockholm, Sweden) |
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