Education Abroad & Honors

Honors students may receive Honors credit equivalent to one honors course elective during education abroad, and there are three ways to do so:

J-Term Travel Seminars
Honors students who register for a J-Term Travel Seminar course that is cross listed with Honors may count that course as an Honors elective as long as it does not put you over the maximum for electives from one discipline.

DU Spain or DU England Semester Abroad
Drake University offers two Drake faculty led semester abroad opportunities, one in Spain and one in England. In both cases a Drake faculty member teaches a course that must be taken by the students on that program. Sometimes that faculty member’s course gets approved for Honors elective credit. Any Honors student on that program may receive Honors elective credit for the successful completion of such a course. To learn more about these too programs, visit the Global Engagement site.

Semester Abroad
Honors students who study abroad for a full semester will (most likely) not receive Honors credit* for any course they take while abroad, but they may complete a specifically designed project that incorporates their experience with interdisciplinary thought and reflection. This special project must be grounded in the site/location, or to put it another way, an approved project ought to be something that could not be completed effectively if the student was still in Des Moines.

For this Independent Study, there are a variety of approaches students may choose, both topically as well as the medium by and through which they choose to complete and convey their experience and learning. Typically, students are asked to keep a journal/blog recording their daily experiences in order to compile a “data-set” on their topic, culminating in a 10-20 page paper. This is not the only option as others — such as a series of videos on or about specific parts of the experience, or a photo-journal commenting and reflecting on key places or events — may be possible after a discussion with the Honors Director.

Lastly, during the semester that immediately follows the semester abroad, the student will give a presentation on their project to the Honors and Drake community.

To receive Honors study abroad credit, students must submit the proposal for a broadly interdisciplinary topic of study prior to the proposed study abroad experience, by midterm of the semester preceding the experience. Please complete for the Honors Program office this Study Abroad for Honors form.

For more information on study abroad please contact the Global Engagement, Education Abroad Office.

*If additional study abroad transfer credits are received in the Quantitative Literacy, Science Literacy (with lab or field experience), or Artistic Literacy areas, the honors program counts that credit toward the AOI category (as transferred/accepted by the Office of the Registrar. Students should work with their primary advisor to ensure that these credits will count for the respective AOIs.)