Honors International Faculty Learning Online (HIFLO 2020): A model for honors online professional development

The Spring of 2020 brought many disruptions to our professional and personal lives due to the COVID-19 pandemic that forced worldwide mid-semester campus closures; pivoting of traditional, face-to-face classes to remote teaching and learning; and postponements or cancellations of conferences, workshops, and other professional development events. One example of the breakdown of scheduled opportunities for us as honors colleagues to gather in-person to enhance our practices and strengthen our community was the cancellation of the 2020 International Conference on Talent Development and Honors Education in Groningen, the Netherlands, originally slated for June 10-12 but moved to June 16-18, 2021. Immediately following the 2020 conference, we (the authors) had planned to offer the fifth Honors International Faculty Institute (HIFI), an international and highly interactive occasion for honors and talent development teachers, researchers, and leaders to engage in presentations, experiential activities, place-as-text explorations, collaborative group work, reflective exercises, and showcases designed to improve teaching, learning, and programming in honors. Suddenly, the coronavirus upended our world, and we had to reimagine the institute that we had previously organized four times alternately at Hanze University of Applied Sciences (Netherlands) and Texas Christian University (USA). Putting aside the disappointment of the moment and recognizing the value of coming up with an alternative to HIFI that would ensure the safety and health of our honors colleagues, we decided to create a fully online version with free registration to encourage participation and create resources accessible to all members of our international community. We wanted to highlight the challenges of how all of us unexpectedly had to pivot to remote teaching and learning as the global pandemic intensified, but we also wanted to share information, experiences, and models that could open new avenues for operationalizing online honors education more generally beyond the COVID-19 crisis. We wanted, in other words, to explore how honors pedagogy could (and maybe should) be adapted to the increasingly online world of primary, secondary, and higher education. Thus, HIFLO 2020 was born! HIFLO stands for Honours International Faculty Learning Online.

Highlights of the 2019 honors session at the International Students’ Conference in Siberian Federal University, Russia

In honors education, creating a community of talented and ambitious students is a goal of primary importance. Honors sessions at international conferences contribute to globalization of the honors community and offer opportunities for starting the dialogue between honors students of different universities and diverse academic fields. The current note provides insight into the discussion at the honors session organized by SibFU Honors College at the international students’ conference “Prospect Svobodny 2019” at the premises of Siberian Federal University in Krasnoyarsk, Russia. The author describes the results of the interdisciplinary research activities presented at the session by honors students from Texas Christian University, Western Michigan University, University of New Mexico, Lamar University, and Siberian Federal University. The note reveals how the honors students’ sessions become forums for reflecting on the value of learner agency and also for exploring the areas of prospective collaboration in interdisciplinary research for honors students worldwide.

Academic skills in the screenish era

Our culture has begun to react to the implications of digital technology for our shared memory and individual privacy in the form of legislation like GDPR. But the culture of higher education---specifically the dominant model of knowledge generation and transmission---stays firmly rooted in the 'bookish' tradition. Honors education was started in response to the changing world in the wake of WWII. Its core principles of engaged learning and individualization of the student experience can lead higher education to embrace the new culture of digital technology-assisted knowledge generation and transmission.

Honors in the Time of Corona

All of us who love what we do as teachers; who love our disciplines, scholarship, and students; who thrive on the challenges and rewards of honors education—we all have faced many new obstacles and disappointments caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Having resources to help us deal with the shifts is key to moving forward. While many concerns have surfaced in our profession, this essay’s collection of international resources focuses on four topics that affect honors in immediate ways: retooling faculty approaches to teaching; addressing student access and success; adapting capstone projects and presentations to online delivery and assessment; and adjusting grades (always a big factor in honors recruitment, retention, scholarships, alumni pathways, and more). To make the collection more useful, the list of resources includes some brief annotations to help organize and preview the items.

High-Ability College Students and Undergraduate Honors Programs: A Systematic Review

Meeting the intellectual needs of high-ability students does not end upon graduation from high school. However, limited attention is paid to the important topic of postsecondary advanced learning in the research literature. In this systematic review, we identified 52 empirical studies published during the past 15 years. Results suggest various cognitive and psychosocial factors influence achievement among high-ability college students and that honors programming leads to positive student outcomes. The findings are discussed in light of the need for an understanding of high-ability college students and postsecondary honors education.