Below are some answers to common questions we have received about applying to continue in Honors:
Question: What happens if a student signs up for an Honors course and then is removed from Honors?
Answer: This question has been raised by several first-year students who have asked what will happen if they sign up for an Honors class for the fall semester, apply to continue in Honors at the end of the spring semester, and then don’t get into the Honors Program. To date, this has only happened one time. When it did happen, we let the student stay in the Honors course.
Typically, students who show enough interest to apply to continue in Honors and who put the time and effort into putting together a compelling application are going to be accepted into the Honors Program. As a result, it is unlikely that this will happen.
We strongly encourage students ending their first year at UT to enroll in Honors courses for the subsequent fall semester.
Question: When are decisions on applications to continue in Honors made?
Answer: We start reading applications as early as we can and make decisions as quickly as possible. There are two factors that delay this process.
First, letters of recommendation don’t always arrive by the deadline (which is okay; we don’t hold that against students as we know faculty are busy).
Second, we typically have over 100 applications to read and evaluate. That simply takes time.
The deadline for first-year students to apply to continue in Honors is the Friday before finals. We will start reviewing any applications that are submitted before the deadline as soon as they are submitted but it may take us until the end of May to evaluate all the applications. As noted above, just because you haven’t received a decision on your application doesn’t mean you shouldn’t register for Honors courses in the fall.