I attended recently a seminar that featured the title of this reflection, “Why Honors?” where a panel of six honors students from the President to Council Representatives answered questions about why students should stay in the Chancellor’s Honors Program and how they can get the most out of the experience. The event was designed to help students understand better the program and it’s benefits for students who might not be fully utilizing the program or who are feeling frustrated with the program.

I had originally just planned on attending the event to receive another credit for going to a Becker seminar, which is one of the requirements of the program, but as I sat listening restlessly to the panel answering a list of most frequently asked questions and just waiting for the end to come, I realized that what the panel was saying was important.

As of right now, I haven’t fully embraced the Honor’s program and let the program work for me. I haven’t utilized all the resources that have been made available to me and  really fully understood why we have the requirements that we have. As I sat listening, I began to really listen to what the panelists were saying about what it means to be a part of the Honor’s program. It’s not just about being an honor’s student, it’s about realizing the messages, lessons and bigger picture of what the program is meant to teach us. Like through the community service requirement, it’s not just about giving back to the community, but immersing ourselves into a community to better improve it. It’s about being able to take that experience of volunteering and learning from it, learning what it means to give your time to someone, what it means to do something that is greater than yourself and learning how it applies to your future.

Through Ready for the World, I realized that it’s suppose to expand your view about the world and culture, but at the event, I realized that it’s more about connecting the world view you gain to your life on campus and after. As I prepare for my trip abroad to Sydney, Australia, I’m taking time to reflect what this study abroad program really means and how it will connect to my life once I’m back in the U.S., because when the trip is over and done, a distant memory fading quickly into the distant past, it can still be tangible through how I incorporate it into my life on campus. What can I learn and do while abroad, that I can bring back home? How can I grow personally and professionally so that when I return, I can continue working towards my goals? What goals do I have for this trip? These are just a few of the thoughts I have as I prepare.

The Honors Program is an honor to be a part of and it requires that you truly immerse yourself into what it means to be an honor’s student. From the panel, I learned that there is a lot of resources available to be that I need to begin utilizing, but first, I need to embrace the Honor’s program and how I am a part of it, how there is more to the program than what I thought there was. Thanks to the Why Honors panel, I now know realize how I need to reevaluate my understanding of the Honors Program and how it can help me be a better member of the Volunteer community.