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This varies with each student. The purpose of the honors program is to make Penn State Altoona a more exciting school for motivated students. The honors sections and honors options should be qualitatively deeper rather than quantitatively more. This might involve more reading and writing than a "normal" class. However, this should not take a significantly more significant amount of time. Students who already feel overworked before they enter the honors program may find the additional honors requirements to be a chore. However, students who are well prepared and motivated will not notice much difference, except that their classes are more interesting!
Your application must be in by the second week of the semester in which you intend to start your honors work.
Most honors programs adopt such a policy. It does not make good sense to admit students into the honors program if they are performing right at the retention cut-off. This puts them in danger of being dismissed from the program during an ensuing semester. Because many students tend to get somewhat higher grades early in their college careers (when classes often are a bit easier), this policy provides a cushion.
Yes! The honors coordinator will sign in non-honors students (bring a filled-out Drop/Add from the Registrar's Office) as long as they understand that an honors section is intended for motivated and engaged students. Honors sections are not available to students who simply are looking for a convenient way to complete their schedule. As the first question above notes, the workload for an honors section is not greater in quantity. However, if a student is not motivated, then the higher quality of the class will no doubt translate to greater difficulty.
No. The honors option is available only to students in the Altoona honors program or the Schreyer Honors College.
No. The Penn State Altoona Honors Program is distinct from the Schreyer Honors College (SHC). However, the Altoona program maintains academic standards that are consistent with SHC. To apply to SHC at the same time that you are applying for admission to Penn State as a first-year student, visit the Application Process page of the Schreyer Honors College site. For all other current students, Schreyer has a Gateway Admission process. For the application, visit the Apply as a Current Student page of the Schreyer Honors College site.