Freshmen entering the University of Oklahoma are eligible to apply to the Honors Curriculum if:

They have a ACT of 29 or higher OR they have a SAT Total of 1280 or higher.

AND

They rank in the top 10% of graduates in their high school class OR they have a high school GPA of 3.75.

Final admission into the Honors curriculum is determinded by the evaluation of the Honors curriculum application form, which includes a written essay of 400-500 words.

Cost

There is no extra cost for participating in the Honors Curriculum. The University is proud to offer this program for its academically talented students.

The University of Oklahoma is committed to recruiting excellent and motivated undergraduate students. The Fall 1999 Honors Freshmen had:

Most are funded with talent-based scholarships through either the National Scholars Program or the OU Scholars Program. A peer group of such academically talented students creates a supportive yet challenging environment in which individuals can flourish.

Honors Students at OU have the advantage of a small college in that they receive close, personal attention from faculty. In addition, they have all of the advantages of a large state university, with over 19,000 students enrolled at OU on the Norman campus. At a research university like OU, there are many excellent science faculty with state-of-the-art laboratories whose research could not be sustained at small colleges. The OU Library, the largest in the state of Oklahoma, has research-level collections of books and journals and the facilities and staff to accommodate scholarly bibliographic work.

Each department has a designated faculty honors coordinator who assists the honors students majoring in that department and ensures that they receive the attention of appropriate faculty members. Thus, the Honors Curriculum works to ensure that no honors students get lost in the large university community.

Honors students are granted graduate student library privileges, which both extend the amount of time for which an item can be checked out and expand the types of items which are accessible for check-out.

All honors students are automatically registered as members of the Honors Student Association (HSA). The HSA is an official student organization at OU and regularly receives funds from the University of Oklahoma Student Association (UOSA) to sponsor projects of interest to honors students and the University community at large.

The Honors Curriculum diligently grooms Honors students to compete for such prestigious awards as the British Marshall Scholarship, the Goldwater Scholarship, the Mellon Fellowship, the NEH Younger Scholar Award, the NSF Graduate Fellowship Program, the Rhodes Scholarship, the Truman Scholarship and the national-level Washington Center Internship Program. Information and applications for these scholarships and internships are kept in the Honors College Office, and our staff is available to guide interested honors students through the often complicated application processes.

An undergraduate degree earned cum laude from the University of Oklahoma is recognized as a prestigious degree. Both the honors curriculum and the increased level of interaction with faculty are excellent preparation for admission to graduate and professional schools. Employers are impressed with the credentials of cum laude graduates from the University of Oklahoma.

The University of Oklahoma Honors College has established unique requirements for graduating cum laude, magna cum laude, or summa cum laude. Both the final transcript and the diploma carry the designation. Degree candidates graduating cum laude wear a crimson satin hood with their cap and gown during the commencement ceremony.

The Honors College Office communicates directly with the Registrar's Office to determine which students earn the degree designation. The designation cum laude requires: