Courses
Honors Courses
Membership in the Honors College enables students to enhance their strengths through a specially designed 27-hour core of cross-disciplinary courses that, with one additional course in both mathematics and science, meet general education requirements for honors students. Cross-disciplinary means that all courses in the core contain information drawn from a minimum of two academic disciplines.
A full list of honors courses can be viewed through the course catalog.
Capstone Project
Students will identify and investigate a problem in a community business, nonprofit agency, or research laboratory, and then work to solve the problem. It is expected that students play an active role in the problem-solving effort and contribute a minimum of ten hours each week to help solve the problem. Interaction with the CEO, senior officer(s) and/or senior investigators of the business, agency, or laboratory, will serve as leader models for student study. A final paper will require students to reflect on the 27-hour core of Honors course work and indicate how lessons from each of the classes helped inform the project, as well as address the project's sustainability. While projects are generally completed in the senior year, students may register for this course upon completion of the 27-hour core or by special permission of the Honors College Director.
The Honors Program has begun an initiative to catalog the Capstones of past Honors students. Capstone Catalog: Student Legacies was the Capstone project of a recent Honors graduate as an effort to provide current Honors students with a resource of Capstone advice and inspiration. The book now serves as a display of the excellent work our students put forth in the campus and surrounding community.
2019 Capstone Award Winner
Food Recovery Network
Honors Students Claire McCreavy, Amanda Sesher, and Kathleen Calvin received the annual Capstone Award for their foundation of the Food Recovery Network on West Chester's campus. Food Recovery Network is a nationwide effort that works to recover food which would otherwise be thrown away, redirecting it to individuals in need. The new WCU Food Recovery Network chapter, established in May of 2018, has recovered food from WCU facilities each Friday during the school year since its establishment--resulting in over 1,000 lbs of recovered food and counting! The food is regularly donated to Safe Harbor of Chester County, where it is served as a part of the community lunch program, serving individuals experiencing hunger week after week. Students across campus can join the movement and continue the legacy started by these Honors graduates.