Brief History

From Engineering Honors

In the Fall of 2005, the College of Engineering, under the leadership of Associate Dean John Bennett and many of the college's most accomplished teachers, formally committed itself to creating an Honors Program that would serve and challenge its best students. In the Spring of 2006, Professor Scot Douglass was appointed the Program's first Faculty Director. Since then, we have been very busy...

Fall 2006: Inaugural class of first-year incoming Honors Students—24 students, all by invitation

Spring 2007: 5 outstanding graduating seniors pilot Engineering Senior Honors Theses and are the first to “graduate with Honors”

Summer 2007: Members of this first class work at the Stanford Particle Accelerator; teach in China; do Bio-Mass research in the forests of Maine; work with CU professors in robotics, nano-technology, computational modeling and environmental research; teach in the Multi-cultural Engineering Program’s Summer Bridge Experience; as well as travel to Nepal, Peru, Europe.

Fall 2007: Second class of incoming Honors Students—45 students via an application process. 40 of these 45 students live together in Hallett Hall as part of the Engineering Honors Program’s Residential Academic Program. Eleven second-year Honors students co-lead recitation sections of Critical Encounters.

Spring 2008: Fourteen million dollar renovation of Andrews Hall begins which will be completed by the Fall of 2009. Andrews Hall, modeled somewhat after the Oxford College, will be entirely devoted to the Engineering Honors Program and will include a residential faculty member and family, special classroom space and study spaces, a high-end computer lab, and be part of a larger community centered in a complex of four residential Halls dedicated respectively to Engineering Honors, Arts and Science Honors, International Studies and a fourth academic program still to be determined (most likely Pre-health).

Aggressive fund raising begins to create endowments to fund overseas experiences and create Honors-specific scholarship funds.

Fall 2008: Third class of incoming Honors Students—64 students via an application process.

Expansion of the Residential Academic Program in Hallett Hall to include first year students and select second and third-year Honors Students. Twenty-seven second and third-year Honors students co-lead recitation sections of Critical Encounters.

Fall 2009: Fourth class of incoming Honors Students—60-70 students via an application process.

Having first, second, third and fourth-year Honors Students for the first time.

Andrews Hall opens