Harriet L. Wilkes Honors College

The Harriet L. Wilkes Honors College is an academic, residential college of Florida Atlantic University, located at the John D. MacArthur campus of FAU in Jupiter, Florida. The Wilkes Honors College opened in 1999 and offers a rigorous liberal arts education through the platform of a public institution, with a focus on interdisciplinary studies. It currently features a student body of 330, and 32 full-time tenured, or tenure-track faculty, all of whom have terminal degrees in their field. The current Dean is Jeffrey Buller, a classicist.Students attending the school take all of their coursework (120+ hours) at the Honors College. This is different from honors programs or most other Honors Colleges where students only take a few honors courses or seminars.The Honors College shares the Jupiter Campus with the Scripps Research Institute and the Max Planck Florida Institute, where many Wilkes Honors College students have been accepted to participate in internships.Beginning in 2006, the Wilkes Honors College, in collaboration with The Scripps Research Institute, hosts the Honors Summer Institute on the topics of science, technology and society for high school juniors and seniors.AcademicsThe Wilkes Honors College offers a full complement of degree-fulfilling courses taught by its own faculty. The college emphasizes small class size, with a faculty-student ratio of approximately 1:10. Its core curriculum, which makes up about a third of credit requirements for the B.A., focuses on critical thinking and writing skills in a broad range of disciplines. Each student must write a substantial honors thesis under the supervision of two faculty advisors during his or her senior year. These collaborations have led to publications in peer-reviewed journals. An additional graduation requirement is that students complete either an internship or a study abroad.