Nov. 26, 2024

The URI Honors Program invites interested faculty teams to submit proposals for the Honors Colloquium, AY 2026-27. The Honors Colloquium is the premier intellectual lecture series at URI and has a strong public following. The mission of the Colloquium is to foster campus- and community-wide conversation on contemporary issues of national and/or global significance through conversations with distinguished scholars, public figures, and a variety of experts. Colloquium proposals should be widely interdisciplinary in nature and have campus-wide appeal. Proposals should also contain the potential to appeal to campus and community partners for parallel events and educational opportunities. Among previous colloquia are:

2024: Democracy in Peril
2023: Not Business as Usual: Business for the Common Good
2022: Just Good Food: Creating Equitable, Sustainable and Resilient Food Systems
2021: Sustaining Our Shores
2020: Challenging Expectations: Disability in the 21st Century
2019: Religion in America
2018: Reimagining Gender: Voices, Power, Action
2017: Origins: Life, the Universe and Everything
2016: Inequality and the American Dream

Funding and administrative support for the Honors Colloquium is robust. There is substantial financial support to bring in distinguished speakers. Additionally, there is funding that can be used by Colloquium coordinators for summer re-contracting or course replacement. The Honors Program helps with all coordination.

In addition to the public lectures, integral to the URI Colloquium are its affiliated 200-level honors courses. Participation in an Honors Colloquium through a designated Colloquium course is a requirement for students in the Honors Program. The average class size for the Honors Colloquium course is 40 students and we plan to run four sections of the Colloquium course. Colloquium organizers should be prepared to teach two of these four sections, and we will work with organizers to identify other faculty members on campus who can teach two other affiliated sections. Sometimes it happens that a Colloquium subject is broad enough that we can run a constellation of Honors courses around the theme. This situation is desirable because it drives major student engagement with the Colloquium.

In conceptualizing the Honors Colloquium course, organizers should keep in mind both the National Collegiate Honors Council (NCHC) learning objectives for Honors courses and the new Honors Program learning outcomes for the Colloquium course. The NCHC learning objectives can be found on the following Course Proposal cover sheet that organizers will submit with the Colloquium course syllabus, if the organizers’ Colloquium proposal is selected. The new Honors program learning outcomes for the Colloquium course are rooted in: creative problem solving; social innovation; interconnection; and, if logical for the proposed Colloquium, policy advocacy.

Selection of the winning proposal is made by the Honors Program. The proposal should include:

• A concept paper of one to two pages that frames the intellectual issue(s)
• A list or brief account of potential speakers and special events
• A rough estimate of a budget
• A brief course description for the 200-level honors class
• A 3-page relevant curriculum vitae for the colloquium coordinator(s).

Please send proposals to Honors Coordinator, Anna Blake (annablake@uri.edu), copying Honors Director, Karen de Bruin (debruin@uri.edu). For any questions or if proposers would like to discuss a potential proposal before submission, please contact Karen de Bruin (debruin@uri.edu). Proposals should be submitted by Jan. 6.

We look forward to reading your proposal!