Math 242E, Fall 2008
Honors Credit for James Scholars
Students who are in the James Scholars program are normally required to
take two honors classes each academic year in order to maintain their
James Scholar status. As an alternative to taking an officially
designated honors class, students may also earn the required honors
credit in a regular class by completing additional work through a
so-called "Honors Credit Learning Agreement" (HCLA). An HCLA effectively
converts a regular class to an honors class for the student involved.
James Scholar students in this class will have the opportunity to
earn the required honors credit in this way (within reasonable limits).
The work will be in the form of several (probably around 4 - 6) projects
illustrating applications of Multivariable Calculus.
I will provide a list of possible projects later
in the semester. The primary source will be the Stewart Calculus text,
which has many suitable projects ("Kepler's Laws", "Volumes of
Hyperspheres", etc.), but I may use other sources as well.
Deadlines: The deadline for completing the work will near the end
of the semester. However, the deadline for applying for honors credit
is usually much earlier in the semester (typically by the sixth week of
class, though it depends on the college). To apply, you will need to complete a form
called "Honors Credit Learning Agreement" (HCLA). The precise procedure
depends on the college. In some colleges (e.g., LAS), you can
complete the form online, while others require a paper application that
the instructor has to sign.
The HCLA form asks for a description of the work to be performed. I
suggest to use the following wording: "4 - 6 projects illustrating
applications of Multivariable Calculus".
Here are some links:
Notes:
- The Honors Credit option is available only to students who have been
designated James Scholars (and those should know who they are). If you
don't know what this is all about, you are likely not eligible. If you
want to know how to become a James Scholar, try the above websites for
more information. I am afraid I can't help with that, but your college
should have an office or person that is in charge of their Honors
program. (In LAS the appropriate office is 270 Lincoln Hall; for
Engineering the office is 206 Engineering Hall.)
-
The Honors Credit option is completely independent of the course
grade. The additional work serves only to satisfy the honors requirement
(this will show up as an "H" in the transcript), but has no effect on the
course grade. Thus, in theory, a student could earn an F in the class,
but do a perfectly satisfactory job on the honors credit extra work.
(In reality, of course, this is unlikely to occur, since the honors
option is only available to James Scholars, and those represent the cream
of the crop among incoming students.)
-
You might want to investigate your other classes to see if they offer
the option of doing an HCLA, and if so, what the work requirements are.
Whether a class does offer this option, is up to the discretion of the
instructor, but many classes do. While I am happy to accept HCLA's in my
241 class within reasonable limits, you may find projects in other
classes more appealing.
While the time investment is likely similar in different classes, the
nature of work may be quite different. For example, take a look
at my Math 408 James Scholar
page; this page lists honors credit projects that I offered to
students in my Math 408 (Actuarial Statistics) class last semester.
(Those projects, of course, would not be appropriate for Math 241
since they are not related to the subject of Math 241. However, if you
ever take Math 408 (or a probability class, such as Math 461) from me,
you could do those, or similar, projects for honors credit.)