Author Description

This handbook is intended to help all those who design, administer, and implement honors thesis programs--honors directors, deans, staff, faculty, and advisors--evaluate their thesis programs, solve pressing problems, select more effective requirements or procedures, or introduce an entirely new thesis program. The authors' goal is to provide everyone involved in honors thesis projects with a range of options, models, and best practices for promoting superior thesis work and justifying to students, to faculty, and to administrators the real value of the honors thesis, as well as the commitment and costs it requires at every level. The authors consider why many honors programs and colleges require every honors program or college student to produce an honors thesis and why some do not. They discuss what honors directors and deans see as the value of a thesis for students, for faculty, for their honors program or colleges, and for their college or university. They explore what might constitute an honors thesis, including traditional research, a creative project in the arts, a pre-professional project, interdisciplinary or collaborative projects, and what some faculty in Education refer to as "action research." This monograph also addresses how honors directors and deans distinguish an honors thesis from such programmatic elements as independent study courses and other faculty-student research projects. The authors examine the advantages and disadvantages of a range of options for an honors thesis program; practical strategies for helping students understand the value and viability of the thesis and for convincing faculty that advising a thesis is worth their time and energy; and solutions to common thesis problems, such as helping students finish on time, improving the percentage of students who complete the thesis, and rewarding faculty for their work. Consequently, this handbook focuses not just on the honors thesis itself but on the whole range of activities that ho