Teaching Arts and Honors: Four Successful Syllabi (Innovative Honors Courses‪)‬

INTRODUCTION My initial experience with honors in academia occurred several years ago when I was approached to teach a 3-credit course as the humanities component of the honors curriculum at Clarion University. Being a musician, I was not quite certain what I could offer these students. The majority of them could not read music, much less play a musical instrument, and I knew that I wanted the course to be more than a typical general education survey course. Several years later, and through participation at National Collegiate Honors Council conferences, I have learned that dilemma is typical in honors programs. I have learned also that the arts are often perceived by students, and occasionally the administration, to be "easy" and "fun," or buzzwords such as "non-academic" and "dispensable," but these misperceptions are dismissed quickly once the rigors of the discipline are introduced.