Syllabus
HON 401-402
Prof. Don Westblade
Academic Year 2006-07

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Description

In the catalogue's words, "The thesis is an interdisciplinary investigation into a topic proposed by the student." Select a topic that has sufficient intrigue to sustain your interest in its exploration over most of the course of an academic year. Aim to identify a question to answer that will require your consideration of it from the perspective of several of the disciplines in which you have invested yourself over the past three years of your college career. You will not necessarily be expected to break new ground, but your readers and audience will expect to hear you developing a point of view that is not merely the descriptive report of another scholar's conclusions but that expresses and argues cogently for your own normative claim in your own unique voice. It contributes little to scholarship if, in Chesterton's words, you simply undertake "elephantine adventures into the obvious." You will need to formulate a claim to defend that you can demonstrate needs defense because it must be made to stand against the objections of rival perspectives. Propose that claim, clarify its significance to scholarship, and argue for and illustrate it as effectively as you can against the winds of opposing challenge.

Registration

Because the thesis constitutes a formal requirement for completion of the Honors Program, at a minimum either HON 401 (the fall course number) or HON 402 (the spring course) must appear on your transcript with a grade for credit. Each of the two courses represents one credit-hour for purposes of registration. You may, of course, register for both courses and receive the full two credit-hours for the project. In either case, the project presupposes two semester credits of work, which (at three hours per week for each of two 15-16 week semesters) amounts to an expected investment of roughly 100 hours of your time over the course of the year. If you register for HON 401, a "DG" (Deferred Grade) will be awarded in the first semester (with no impact upon the first semester's average), and the DG will be replaced with the actual evaluation at the conclusion of the spring semester (and the unit of credit will at that point be factored into the cumulative GPA).

Objectives

HON 401/2 aims...

• to gain new perspective upon a scholarly question by approaching it from the vantage points of multiple disciplines.
• to yield distinct written and oral presentations of an interdisciplinary exploration involving some 100 hours of academic work.
• to exercise conscious attention to the differences between the rhetoric of writing and that of oral delivery.
• to build facility in taking effective advantage of the advice of mentors in a tutorial setting.
• to foster good research and composition skills in the extended development of a large project.

Process

• Register for either or both of HON 401 and/or 402.
• Attend the mandatory informational tray-supper meeting of HON 401/2 at 5:45 pm, Thursday, August 24, in the Knorr Room.
• In consultation with the program director and other faculty, develop an interdisciplinary idea into a workable proposal.
• Assemble a committee of three faculty who will serve as mentors for the project. The committee will ordinarily consist of:

(1) the honors director,
(2) one member of the faculty honors committee (Brad Birzer, Kathy Connor, David Jones, Will Morrisey, Angie Pytel, Stephen Smith; each member will accept a maximum of 5 advisees), and
(3) one professor from a discipline as near to the heart of your subject matter as possible.

Exceptions to this construction of your committee require consultation with the program director prior to submission of the prospectus.

• By Friday, October 6, present the proposal to each member of your committee in the form of an initial written prospectus, including self-constructed due dates for at least four phases of your research that will bring you reasonably to a completed project by Wednesday, March 28. See ingredients of the prospectus below.
• On the basis of recommendations suggested by your committee, revise the prospectus for final submission on or before Wednesday, October 25.
• Consult with each of the mentors on your committee on some regular schedule agreed upon by each mentor.
• Present written or emailed evidence to the program director of your having achieved each phase of your research by its proposed due date.
• Deliver a 3-minute (maximum!) summary of your project's hypothesis and arguments at the (mandatory) Sunday evening gathering of the honors program on January 21.
• At the Sunday meeting on Jan 21, select a time slot in which to give your oral presentation during the period of April 2 - 6.
• Complete any final, written drafts upon which you wish comments from mentors by March 2. Written comments from mentors after this deadline may be expected only for the oral presentation.
• Submit a final draft of the written thesis, reflecting any revisions in response to mentor comments, to all three mentors by 5:00 pm on Wednesday, March 28 [Final due date updated t Wednesday, April 4].
• Deliver a 30-minute (maximum) oral presentation of the argument of the paper in a manner that maintains audience engagement and prompts thoughtful questions and interaction for an additional 10 to 15 minutes. (A direct reading of the written paper or an extension of the formal presentation beyond the 30-minute limit will result in penalization of the oral component of the project's evaluation.)

  Aug 22-23	Preregistration dates for HON 401
  Aug 24 5:45pm)	Mandatory Organizational meeting of HON 401-02 (Knorr Rm tray supper)
  Oct 6(5:00pm)	Deadline for submitting preliminary prospectus, committee composition, and due dates
  Oct 25(5:00pm)	Deadline for submitting final prospectus reflecting committee recommended revisions
  Jan 15-16	Preregistration dates for HON 402
  Jan 21	Mandatory 3-min presentation of thesis to program colleagues (knorr Rm tray supper); afterwards we will select time-slots for April presentations
  Mar 2	Last submission date for drafts that will receive advisor comments
  Apr 4(5:00pm)	Deadline for submitting final written draft to three advisors
  Apr 9-16	Thesis Presentations (dates are Holy Week and likely to be revised!)
  Apr 27	Senior Dinner (7:00pm - 8:30pm)
  Apr 20	Deadline for submitting digital copy (subject to revision with presentation dates)

• Submit an electronic version (MSWord, .html, or .pdf) of the revised paper, reflecting any corrections that may be suggested by interaction with your audience and your advisors, to the program director by Friday, April 13 [new date: Friday, April 20]. This version will be uploaded to the Honors Program's online journal, Amnesis.
  

Mandatory Meetings and Due Dates

Extensions

You are hereby granted up to 5 total days of extensions. You may expend this bank of days as needed on any or all of your due dates except for the meetings of Aug 24, Jan 21, your presentation date during the week of April 2 - 6 [9-16], and the deadlines of March 2 and March 28 [April 4]. Each (actual, not class) day that submissions are delayed beyond these 5 extension days, or beyond the fixed due dates, and likewise any missed meeting will result in a penalty of 5% per day from the total project grade. Appropriate allowances will be made for illnesses and extreme family emergencies (but only) in the case of dates and meetings that are not subject to the extension bank.

Prospectus

Here are the ingredients of a complete proposal, for the record:

• Your name and contact information
• A working title
• A clear statement of the (hypo-)thesis you intend to defend (this can be altered over time as researched evidence and better arguments lead you to revisions of the conclusion)
• A defense of the project's interdisciplinary character
• Some preliminary (and brief) sketch of primary arguments that appear to you initially to support the case you expect to make
• Your initial working bibliography (books, periodical articles, websites, and other resources)
• Names of the committee of profs who will be helping to advise and evaluate the project (typically 3: one from the honors committee, one from an academic discipline close to the center of the project's topic area, and yours truly, the honors director)
• A schedule of (at least 4) dated steps that will get you reasonably from proposal to presentation by a deadline of March 28 [April 4], 2007 (the Wednesday before the 4/2-6 [9-16] presentation week); these will serve as due dates that the program director will then enforce (your timely adherence to them will contribute to the project's evaluation)
• And any other ingredients your other two committee members think it advisable to include for a successful launch of the project

Formats

The eight (-plus) elements of the prospectus can be prepared in any convenient but sensible (and typewritten) format that you prefer (serif fonts only (e.g., Times, Palatino, Courier, etc.); sans-serif fonts are generally inappropriate for formal presentation). The proposal should be produced in triplicate in order to distribute it to each of the three members of your advisory committee on (or before) its two due dates. Your committee may advise revisions or redirections as a response to the prospectus. Those recommendations should be incorporated into a revised proposal and resubmitted to all three on the committee. If it seems convenient to you to assemble the three together for a joint discussion of the project, organizing such meetings will be up to you. In any event, all three profs should sign off on an accepted proposal by Wednesday, October 25.

The final written project can be of whatever length and format seem appropriate to your subject matter and reflective of the advice of your committee. Typically the paper should adhere to the style guidelines of the scholarly journals most near to its subject area. (Literary studies would employ the MLA format; historical and philosophical inquiries would most appropriately document their citations in footnotes; psychological studies would follow the format of journals in psychology; and so on.) Text of the paper should be typed and printed in a serif font.

The oral presentation of the project should run as close to 30 minutes as possible, and you should expect to interact with questions from your audience for another 10 to 15 minutes after that. While the oral presentation ought to draw substantively and thoroughly from the material of the written paper, it is an amateur mistake to expect a mere reading of the paper (or even of a written script distilled from the paper) to serve as an effective oral presentation. Your interdisciplinary instincts should alert you to the important differences between a written and an oral rhetorical environment. Plan to keep your audience as engaged as you hope your readers will be.

CRITERIA FOR EVALUATION

Prospectus: (10%)
Full credit - Satisfies the committee's expectations in a timely manner.
Partial credit - Timely submission, but reflecting incomplete or inadequate preparation.
Penalties - See the extension policy concerning penalties for delayed completion of the prospectus.

Research: (10%)
Due dates observed (5%) - Work maintains pace of due dates proposed in the prospectus.
  Penalties - See the extension policy concerning penalties for delayed completion of the research.
Style and legibility (5%) - Drafts submitted to the committee in evidence of fulfillment of due dates will be graded for style. It is a category mistake to construe the term "rough draft" as an invitation to employ your mentoring committee as proofreaders for technical errors. Up to 5% of the project grade can be forfeited for submissions to your readers that have not been proofread for grammar, syntax, spelling, and punctuation.

Written paper: (45%)
A - A consistently top-quality study that excels in clarity of thesis, substance of content, breadth of interdisciplinary perspective, logical cogency, thoroughness of argument, refutation of rival positions, depth of research in primary and secondary sources, responsiveness to mentor counsel, lucid style, grammatical and syntactical accuracy, and appropriateness of length and scope to the 100 hours of anticipated investment.
B - A commendable study that falls short of outstanding work in a number of the areas cited in the above category.
C - Adequate coverage of the chosen material but falling short of the usual expectations of an honors student's potential.
D - A study characterized by important deficiencies in several of the areas cited above.
F - A study that fails to demonstrate the competency usual to ordinary collegiate research.

Oral Presentation: (35%)
A - Delivery succeeds well in keeping the audience engaged and informed; in conveying effectively the substantive argument of the written paper, with minimal reliance upon a mere reading of the paper's text; in accurately assessing and conforming to the audience's level of intellect and preparation; in providing helpful but not distracting visual supports for the presentation; in demonstrating careful advance preparation; in modulating the voice appropriately; in timing the length of presentation within the limit of 30 minutes; in prompting thoughtful questions and challenges from the audience in the 10-15 minutes of interaction that follows the formal presentation; and in responding intelligently to the audience's questions.
B - A commendable delivery that falls short of outstanding work in a number of the areas cited in the above category, or that otherwise succeeds but relies wholly upon a reading of the written text.
C - An adequate presentation of the written argument but falling short of the usual expectations of an honors student's potential.
D - A presentation characterized by important deficiencies in several of the areas cited above.
F - A presentation that fails to demonstrate a competency of clear communication.

The Journal
A digital copy of the written thesis (MSWord, html, Acrobat, or similar format) is due to the program director's email log within two weeks after the end of the presentations (i.e., by April 13 [20], 2007) so that a permanent record of the project may be kept on file for the college in the Honors Program's online Journal, Anamnesis. Adherence to this deadline will also be reflected in the project evaluation (see extension policy). No grade will be awarded for HON 401 or 402 until all elements of the project, including the digital copy, have been fully submitted. (From this point forward into the indefinite future, revisions of the online version of the paper may be sent to the honors director and will be uploaded in replacement of the current online version.)

I'm available to you at any time for any consultation about the development of your topic. If you have questions, email me dwestblade@hillsdale.edu, look for me during the school year in Delp 327 (afternoons, generally), or in the Honors Lounge (occasionally), or call x.2381 (517-607-2381).