Latin Honors at Washington University

The following is a guest submission that provides an interesting perspective on Latin Honors at Washington University.

An issue that I have only begun to analyze and make observations on is that of the Honors system here at Wash U and the award system in general. The idea of celebrating achievement is honorable in it of itself and should be something we strive to do. But how we honor achievement is a question that cannot be taken lightly. With every “best” we celebrate we are also denouncing a multitude of “not bests” which directly translate into how theses students will interpret their performance at the university.

Let me explain this through an example. In a smaller department where on any given year there might only be two to three theses writers, the awarding of a prize to the best thesis will provide for the awarded a short sense of additional accomplishment while suggesting to the other one or two Latin Honors recipients that their work is lacking in some way. Do we want our students who may be graduating with Magna or just Cum Laude to feel a sense of inadequacy with the work they’ve produced?

But I want to take this discussion even further. I would like to suggest the establishment of such awards along with the structure of the Latin Honors program in general is a defeating aspect of the Wash U, and perhaps collegiate in general, experience. Your GPA should be enough to award you the recognition of graduating with honors. If it isn’t, what does it mean then? What does four years of successful comprehension and application mean if not the recognition of honors?

The exploration of the honors program as well as the extreme variance in the awarding of honors needs to be reexamined by the university. But beyond that I would like to commend those who actively decided not to pursue a thesis. Those individuals recognized earlier that their collegiate success is not dependent on a systematic grading scale that is as arbitrary as the language used to describe it. I want Wash U to return to the idea that just graduating, that is just completing four years at an advanced research academic institution, is more than enough for recognition.

And yet it remains inadequate.