In May 2011, Dutch students from the honors program in geosciences of Utrecht University, led by Professor Marca Wolfensberger, engaged in an experimental-learning project in Paris, France, with a group of American students from the honors program of Columbia College, South Carolina, led by Professors …

According to the Dutch Ministry of Education ten percent of all students in higher education have to participate in a program that promotes excellence by 2014. This as the utterance of the ambition of the government and business to be part of the top five world knowledge economies. In this explorative …

Qualities honours students look for – revisited.

Meer halen uit de beste studenten in het hoger onderwijs: dat is het motto van het Sirius Programma. Het doel: inzicht verkrijgen in wat de beste manier is om excellentie te bevorderen en inzicht in de belemmeringen die hiervoor in de huidige situatie bestaan. Vanuit dit vertrekpunt zijn 20 hogescholen …

Key elements within honors teaching and learning

The importance of international conferences in promoting excellence in honors education

How to enhance the professional development of faculty teaching in honors education

One of the factors that differentiate honors from regular teaching at the Faculty of Geosciences at Utrecht University, the Netherlands, is the freedom that honors students enjoy, a freedom that evokes excellence because it is focused and targeted. This targeted freedom takes three different shapes in …

In Dutch universities, honors programs are a fast growing development. The first such programs started in 1993. Twenty years later a large number of programs are implemented at nearly all research universities and also at many universities of applied sciences in the Netherlands. Recent data have revealed …