The Bloomsburg University Honors Program offers opportunities for an enriched college experience to students seeking academic challenge.

The Honors Program's goals are: to challenge students to perform at the highest level of excellence to encourage independent thinking and learning

• to create a supportive environment that encourages the aspirations and achievements of students and fosters their dignity, self esteem and sense of initiative

• to encourage creativity, intellectual independence, analytical thinking and problem solving and the growth of communication skills through a strong emphasis on reading, writing and research

• to provide opportunities for students to develop a broader perspective on national and global issues

• to provide forums for symposia, experiential learning and independent study

• to create a meaningful learning community

• to develop students' leadership potential

• to enable students to engage in a rigorous, coherent, integrated academic experience with a high degree of student-faculty interaction

The Honors Program encourages students to explore opportunities for post-graduate work and professional study. The Honors Program is proud of the high rate of acceptance of Bloomsburg honors students to professional and graduate programs.

Typically, honors classes are smaller, offering students opportunities to discuss in greater depth the subject being taught. Honors classes are often enriched through field trips, guest speakers, films and special projects.

New freshmen applying for admission to the program must have a minimum of 1150 SAT combined and above 550 on both the verbal and math portions of the SAT. Student must also rank in the top 20 percent of their high school class. The class rank criteria is waived for students with SATs of greater than 1250. Admittance to the program for students already at Bloomsburg is based on academic performance at Bloomsburg University with a minimum grade point average of 3.25 required.

The Honors Program awards merit scholarships on a competitive basis to entering freshmen. Some upper-level competitive merit scholarships are also available each year. Many honors students also qualify for other merit scholarships, such as the Mitrani and Presidential awards.

Honors students at Bloomsburg take 25 hours of honors courses that include honors general education courses, honors upper division seminars and two semesters of honors independent study culminating in an honors thesis.