You are in the official 2005-2006 General Catalog
for California State University, Fresno.

Honors

The Smittcamp Family Honors College

Stephen Rodemeyer, Director

McLane Building, Room 200
2345 East San Ramon Avenue, M/S MH128
Fresno, CA 93740-8031

Phone: 559.278.8160
Toll Free: (877) 323-2089
FAX: 559.278.8162

E-mail: honors@csufresno.edu

http://honors.csufresno.edu

What is an honors program?

Simply put, it is a program of educational opportunity for outstanding students. It takes the form of specially structured academic offerings designed to engage students more comprehensively and intellectually with an institution's best faculty on virtually a one-to-one basis. Honors studies provide top students the opportunity to function in the most stimulating and challenging intellectual learning environment an institution can create.

Earl and Muriel Smittcamp Family

California State University, Fresno planned to establish a program of honors study for many years. With an initial generous gift of $1 million from the Earl and Muriel Smittcamp Family, the plan for the Honors College is now a reality.

The Honors College

Studying the best programs in the country, the university created a concept for an honors education at Fresno State.

Working to provide the advantages of a small liberal arts college within the resources of a major university, the Honors College offers three types of degrees with honors: University Honors, College/School Honors, and Department Honors. A degree with University Honors is based in General Education honors studies and requires 24 lower division and 9 to 12 upper-division units. All courses are specially designed and will be available only to honors students. The initial offerings are structured so all honors students take these courses together, thereby becoming a special honors learning community in which students and faculty truly share a common experience. In order to stimulate maximum student/faculty interaction, courses will be limited to 25 students each.

College/School Honors are earned at the upper-division level. Students may pursue a special program of advanced study within the college/school of their chosen discipline. Currently, the Sid Craig School of Business has such a program in place. In time, all colleges/schools plan to have comparable upper-division programs for their majors.

Department Honors, also earned at the upper-division level, allow students to pursue an advanced program of study within their major. The Psychology Department and the Criminology Department currently have such programs, and the university is actively encouraging and supporting the development of honors programs in other departments.

Honors Colloquium

A distinctive offering of our Honors College over and above the innovative design of our courses is each semester's Honors Colloquium. Designed around the "town meeting" model, each semester's offerings will be focused on a topic of current importance. Sample topics might be "Public Service and Private Life," and "The United States and Social Responsibility: Self Improvement vs. Global Imperatives." A combination of faculty experts, University Lecture Series guests, and various outside authorities will address the topic in a weekly public gathering. Honors students then engage with the week's expert in a dialogue that grows from the expert's presentation. The honors director or other faculty is the moderator; our campus community at large is invited as audience.

These colloquia also provide opportunities for faculty to present their own research. The campus can learn about a colleague's research while students experience models for presenting their own research. Finally, Honors students themselves will use the colloquia as a vehicle for publicly presenting their own senior honors projects.

Scholarships

Assisted by Student Affairs and Financial Aid, President Welty pairs the honors academic opportunity with financial opportunity.

All 75 students in each Smittcamp Family Honors College class receive a President's Honors Scholarship Grant. This consists of the equivalent of full tuition and fees, an annual $200 book allowance, and free housing on campus for all four years of a student's honors study.

The program is designed to attract more freshmen students to California State University, Fresno. The intellectual level of the campus is enhanced by Honors College offerings and activities; the impact resonates throughout the Central Valley.

For more information, contact the director of the Honors College.

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COURSES

Honors (HONOR)

1. Honors Colloquium (1; max total 6)
Open to students in the honors program only. Colloquium for students in the Smittcamp Family Honors College. Overview of the university. Presentation and discussion of current topics. Special presentations by faculty, campus guests, and senior honors project students.

101. Emerging Voices after Colonialism:
Revolution in Theory, Revolution in Practice (4)
Open to students in the honors program only. Explores the expanding field of post colonial studies. Postcolonialism critically analyzes the dialectic between Western imperialism and resistance to colonialism in Africa, Asia, and the Caribbean. Readings will include primary sources, essays of criticism and theory, colonial literature, and a diverse selection of novels from formerly colonized nations.*

102. Revolutions in Natural and Social Sciences (4)
Open to students in the honors program only. Examines fundamental changes in natural and social sciences. Focuses first on revolutions in natural sciences particularly in physics and biology. Then surveys major changes in economic theory with an emphasis on the so-called marginal revolution.*

103. Ecological Social Effects (4)
Open to students in the honors program only. Examines the impact of the Industrial Revolution and the accompanying industrialized nations' demand on Third World nations for tropical products. Puts the Industrial Revolution into global perspective by integrating biological, geographical, ecological, historical, and social effects. *

180. Special Projects in Honors (1-3; max total 9)
Open to students in the honors program only. Individual projects in the Smittcamp Family Honors College. Projects related to Honors College courses; for example, internships, research papers, community service projects, new classroom approaches, and learning communities.

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* For honors students, HONOR 101, 102, and 103 fulfill G.E. areas IB, IC, ID, and M/I. See honors adviser for prerequisites.

 

Other Honors Courses

ARMS 20H. Arts of Armenia (3)
Open to students in the honors program only. Introduces Armenian architecture, painting, sculpture, ceramics, metal work and textiles. G.E. Breadth C1.

BIOL 10H. Life Science (3)
Open to students in the honors program only. Not open to students with credit BIOSC 1A. Shows how living things work and why they work that way. Discusses biology from chemical and physical foundations through ecological and evolutionary processes. Examines biology and its relationship to human affairs. (2 lecture, 2 lab hours) G.E. Breadth Area B2.

CFS 38H. Honors Life Span Development (3)
Open to students in the honors program only. Basic theories, research, and principles of physical, cognitive, and psychological development from conception to death presented from the perspective of diverse families. Emphasizes reading original theoretical and empirical works by prominent developmentalists and requires a student-conducted research project. G.E. Breadth E1.

CHEM 10H. Chemistry and Society (4)
Open to students in the honors program only. Prerequisite: G.E. Foundation B4. Not open to students with credit in college chemistry; for non-science majors. Discusses significance of chemical principles in contemporary society; benefits and hazards relative to areas such as energy, health, diet, environment and agriculture. (3 lecture, 3 lab hours) G.E. Breadth B1.

COMM 6H. Rhetoric for Autonomy and Collaboration
in the Marketplace of Ideas (3)
Open to students in the honors program only. Explores invitational rhetoric and its civic function in contemporary public discourse; experiences designed to enhance fundamental communication skills - - research, organization, reasoning, empathic listening and problem-solving - - through series of oral presentations. G.E. Foundation A1.

DRAMA 75H. Theatre in Contemporary American Culture (3)
Open to honor students only. Introduction to the practice and scholarship of American theatre today. Application of critical methodology for four areas of theatrical production (1) theatre architecture, (2) acting, (3) directing, and (4) design. Attendance at two to three theatre performances is required. G.E. Breadth C1.

ENGL 42H. Creative Writing (4)
Open to students in the honors program only. Prerequisite: G.E. Foundation A2 (ENGL 1). Beginning workshop in the writing of poetry and fiction; appropriate readings and analysis. G.E. Breadth C1.

GEOL 8H. Natural Disasters and Earth Resources (4)
Open to students in the honors program only. Prerequisite: G.E. Foundation B4. Processes and materials that produce the different geologic resources and hazards (earthquakes, volcanoes, floods, landslides.) Plate tectonic theory (including continental drift) as the unifying model to explain geologic phenomena. Emphasizes the relationship between geology and humans. (3 lecture, 2 lab hours)

HIST 15H. Trials of the Century (3)
Open to students in the honors program only. Prerequisite: G.E. Foundation A2 (ENGL 1). Studies celebrated legal trials from 1896 to 2000 as windows for understanding larger historic context. Cases address issues such as racial discrimination, freedom of speech and religion, reproductive rights, consumer protection, war crimes, treason and capital punishment. G.E. Breadth D1. (Formerly HIST 12H, HIST 20H)

HUM 10H. Introduction to the Humanities of the Western World (3)
Open to students in the honors program only. Prerequisites: G.E. Foundation A2 (ENGL 1). Accelerated survey of the relationships between the art, literature, and philosophy of classical antiquity, from classical Greece to the dawn of the Renaissance. G.E. Breadth C2.

MATH 45H. Exploring Mathematics (3)
Open to students in the honors program only. Prerequisite: Student must meet the ELM requirement. Covers topics from the following areas: (1) The Mathematics of Social Choice; (2) Management Science and Optimization; (3) The Mathematics of Growth and Symmetry; and (4) Statistics and Probability. General Education Foundation B4, Quantitative Reasoning.

MUSIC 60H. Music in Social Context (3)
Open to students in the honors program only. Exploration of various settings in which music has been an important indicator of social class and class values. Emphasis on western classical music and American jazz. Attendance at 2-3 performances of music required. G.E. Breadth C1.

NSCI 4H. Science and Nonsense: Critical Thinking and
the Philosophy of Science (3)
Open to students in the honors program only. Shows the use of language, rational inquiry, and logic in science, distinguishing science fact from science fiction. Inductive and deductive methods, judgement, opinion, origins of knowledge, belief and actions. A critical examination of contemporary pseudoscientific issues (creation science, UFOs, astrology, etc.) G.E. Foundation A3.

NUTR 53H. Nutrition and Health: Realities and Controversies (3)
Open to students in the honors program only. Optimal nutrition to reduce the risk of cancer, heart disease, allergies, hyperactivity, and other diseases. Social, psychological, and cultural dictates that affect food selection and health. Personal strategies to develop a nutrition plan for better health. G.E. Breadth E1.

PHIL 32H. Life, Death, and Afterlife (3)
Open to students in the honors program only. Diverse reflections (religious and philosophical) on the meaning of life, death, and afterlife. The nature of the soul (e.g. immortal/mortal); connection to body; implications of an afterlife (if any) for this life; includes Western and non-Western perspectives. G.E. Breadth E1.

PHIL 35H. Logic for Autonomy and Collaboration
in the Marketplace of Ideas (3)
Open to students in the honors program only. Explores techniques for analysis of reasoning in contexts ranging from interpersonal communication through scholarly and political discourses. Theoretical grounding for these techniques, including both central ideas from philosophy of logic and readings from classical and contemporary sources on freedom of thought, freedom of conscience, and the autonomy of reason. G.E. Foundation A3.

PLSI 2H. American Government and Institutions (3)
Open to students in the honors program only. Prerequisite: G.E. Foundation A2 (ENGL 1). Meets the United States Constitution requirement and the federal, California state, and local government requirement, Not open to students with credit in PLSI 101. Development and operation of government in the United State; study of how ideas, institutions, laws and people have constructed and maintained a political order in America. G.E. Breadth D2.

PLSI 71H. Introduction to Environmental Politics (3)
Open to students in the honors program only. Prerequisite: G.E. Foundation A2 (ENGL 1). Introduction to study of environmental politics and policy making in the United States; a brief history of environmentalism; basic principles in environmental policy making, including policy making for interest groups, legislatures, and levels of government; and selection of current topics in environmental issues. G.E. Breadth D3.

PSYCH 62H. Introduction to Social and Cultural Psychology (3)
Open to students in the honors program only. Prerequisite: G.E. Foundation A2 (ENGL 1). Interaction between social environments and behavior with an emphasis on culture and cultural differences. Includes topics such as social influence and beliefs, conformity, the self, attitude change, group influence, prejudice and racism, aggression, attraction and intimacy, altruism and helping. G.E. Breadth D3.

 

 

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