Home > MetNews

Orphaned program faces challenges
Lack of leadership, perception problems plague Honors' future
By Allison Bailey
abaile19@mscd.edu

Photo by Jason Small • jsmall4@mscd.edu Wil Votel, a junior in the Honors Program, discusses scholarships in the honors lounge in the West Classroom. He said school is an environment for thinking about thinking, and the honors lounge is a quiet place where students can concentrate on learning.

Metro’s status as a nontraditional, commuter campus, combined with the apparent perception that the Honors Program is elitist, may be contributing to waning interest in the program and disagreements about how it should be supported

The program is still looking for an interim director, as no acceptable candidates have applied for the position.

According to Linda Curran, director of Academic Affairs at Metro, the administration wants to hire a tenured or tenure-track professor, but so far only adjunct faculty members have applied.

Curran said that one reason the position remains unfilled is that Adolph Grundman, the former director of the program, tendered his resignation from the position two weeks into the semester.

Elizabeth Holtze, who teaches an honors-level English class at Metro, saw an administration e-mail about the empty position.

“I guess that I’m not surprised that there would be a lack of enthusiasm for taking on the task,” she said.

Grundman, who is also a history professor at Metro, attributes the lack of interest to confusion over what the program should be and how it should be run.

“If this is an attractive position, it seems to me that 10 people should have applied,” he said. “I think people are looking at this … and I think they’re saying, ‘It doesn’t make a lot of sense,’ or ‘I don’t want to get involved with this.’”

The administration’s understanding of the Honors Program and the problems that beset it can be found in documents prepared by Curran. The documents are based on her conversations with the provost, Rodolfo Rocha, and her understanding of what Metro President Stephen Jordan expects from all Metro programs.

“The Honors Program has been perceived as ‘elitist’ and out-of-sync with MSCD’s mission,” one of the documents reads.

“That is a cheap shot,” Grundman said. “I’ve thought about it either as a cheap shot or a red herring. That particular comment just didn’t make sense.”

Curran said she couldn’t remember whether the perception of elitism was one held by the administration or by the student body.

“It was basically conveyed to me as something that was identified in the last program review, and I think that was seven years ago,” she said. “It wouldn’t be, I think, repeated unless it has some basis in fact.”

According to Curran, students who know the program exists think that honors students are smart and get special treatment.

However, Curran disagreed with this assessment and said that the only special treatment she knows of is a lounge housed in the honors office that honors students are allowed to use.

The documents mention several other issues with the program, including advising, recruiting and fundraising.

Grundman said that a lack of honors scholarships is a great hindrance when it comes to recruiting new students from high schools.

About three years ago, Grundman said, the money for honors scholarships was cut from about $40,000 to $30,000.

“You’re going out to schools and you’re looking at potential honors students … These students can get scholarships to CU, Harvard, Yale, they’re in a position to make certain demands, and the question is, what do you have that’s going to attract them?”

Curran said the question of scholarships was a good one.

“We run into that problem with scholarships with all areas, not just the Honors Program.”

Many students come to Metro from UNC and CU, not just because of the lower tuition, but also because of smaller classes and extra attention from faculty, Curran said.

“Yes, we don’t offer enough scholarships. But again, that can’t be the only reason that students come and join the Honors Program,” she said.

According to honors student Karlee Castro, the program is definitely in need of funding, particularly for the upcoming National Honors Conference in Philadelphia.

“We have four students presenting this year, and we’re having trouble finding funding to send all of them,” she said.

Curran said there are currently no plans to increase funding for the program, but that showing that honors students contribute something positive to the college would go a long way toward getting more funding for the program.

“Some of them are involved in tutoring, but I just am not aware of other things that students in the Honors Program do,” she said. “The whole program suffers from a lack of visibility.”

She suggested more honors students participate in tutoring to become engaged in the community.

Holtze said she is in favor of all students participating in service learning but that it may not be something all students can do.

“I have never known students who are busier than Metro students,” Holtze said. “They work full time, they go to school full time, they’re full-time parents.”

Grundman and Castro both said they think the admissions office could help the program increase visibility by telling new students about it. Curran said strategies for increasing the visibility of the program are still being discussed.

Curran said the administration is still at the stage of trying to identify issues with the Honors Program and exploring possible solutions.

“It seems to me that people should have gotten together and said, ‘What are the strengths of the program, what are the weaknesses of the program? Let’s see what would be realistic,’”

Grundman said. “And do this sort of as a conversation where we can exchange ideas. And that wasn’t the approach.”

The administration is trying to bring an outside consultant who specializes in honors programs to evaluate the program at Metro and make suggestions on how to resolve some of the problems it faces, Curran said.

She had not yet heard whether the consultant would accept the offer.