To the Seventh Generation: Inheritance and Legacy

To the Seventh Generation:

Inheritance and Legacy

HONORS PROGRAM GUIDE

January 1, 2020 – December 31, 2021

HONORS IN ACTION

Honoring Scholars, Building Leaders

PHI THETA KAPPA HONOR SOCIETY

Center for Excellence

1625 Eastover Drive

Jackson, MS 39211

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The name, logo, and various titles herein have been registered with the U.S. Patent and

Trademark Ofce. The Phi Theta Kappa Honors Program Guide is published once every

two years by Phi Theta Kappa, 1625 Eastover Drive, Jackson, MS 39211, 601.984.3504.

ABOUT PHI THETA KAPPA

Phi Theta Kappa is the premier honor society recognizing the academic achievement

of college students and helping them to grow as scholars and leaders. The Society is

made up of more than 3.5 million members and nearly 1,300 chapters in 11 nations.

PUBLISHER

Phi Theta Kappa, Inc.

EDITORIAL AND DESIGN

President and CEO

Dr. Lynn Tincher-Ladner

Vice President of Student Engagement

Dr. Blake Ellis

Associate Vice President, Honors Programming and

Undergraduate Research

Susan Edwards

Associate Vice President, Program Implementation

Jennifer Stanford

Curriculum Designer

Ragan Chastain

Intern

Miracle Hunter

Associate Vice President, Marketing and Communications

Katherine Scanlon

Copywriter/Content Analyst

Tracee Walker

Multimedia Designer

Blair White

Project Manager

Tracy Kleven

TOPIC, THEME, AND CONTENT DEVELOPMENT

Honors Program Council

Chair

Associate Vice President, Honors Programming and

Undergraduate Research-Phi Theta Kappa

Susan Edwards

Humanities Representative

Dr. Rosie L. Banks

Honors Consultant

Dr. Joan Gallagher Fedor

Leadership Development Representative

Prof. Steven J. Fritts

Technical/Workforce Representative

Dr. Patricia D. Hall

STEM Representative

Prof. Rahul Kane

Social Sciences/Communication Representative

Prof. Cassandra Powell

Service Learning Representative

Prof. Lara A. Roemer

Humanities Representative

Dr. Terri Smith Ruckel

STEM Representative

Dr. Mitch Stimers

Associate Vice President of STEM and

Workforce Programs-Phi Theta Kappa

Dr. Johannah B. Williams

Honors Program Guide 1

Contents

Phi Theta Kappa Honors in Action ........................................................................ 2

How to Use This Program Guide ........................................................................... 3

Honors in Action At-A-Glance ............................................................................... 4

To the Seventh Generation: Inheritance and Legacy ..........................................5

Theme 1: The Heirs of our Ways ...........................................................................8

Theme 2: Natural and Constructed Environments ..............................................10

Theme 3: Trade, Craftsmanship, and Industry .....................................................12

Theme 4: Expressions of Truth ..............................................................................14

Theme 5: Resistance – Reform, Rebellion, Revolution ........................................16

Theme 6: Perceptions of Progress ........................................................................18

Theme 7: Life and Death ........................................................................................20

Honors in Action Planning Rubric .........................................................................22

Identifying and Analyzing Academic Sources ......................................................25

Developing a Research Question..........................................................................29

Honors in Action Journal .......................................................................................30

Sample Honors in Action Project ..........................................................................32

Phi Theta Kappa Honors Program Council ..........................................................36

Phi Theta Kappa Honors Study Topics ..................................................................37

2 Honors Program Guide

OUR HONORS PROGRAM: HONORS IN ACTION

Phi Theta Kappa features a remarkable program called Honors in Action, designed to engage students in informed

action meant to foster student success and help the organization fulll its mission of providing college students

opportunities to grow as scholars and leaders.

By engaging in the academic research process from the beginning, developing a research question, compiling the

research, and presenting it to a wider audience via the Hallmark Award entry process, students gain valuable research

and service learning experience. The students’ engagement does not stop at academic research, as they will take

the lessons learned from the research and analysis process and create an action-oriented project to provide tangible

support within the issue area in their community.

Through these experiences, students will build both practical and academic skills. By working closely with their peers

as well as campus and community leaders, students will learn not only how to research an issue, but how to utilize

resources and build professional relationships.

HONORS IN ACTION LEARNING OUTCOMES

Participation in Honors in Action contributes to personal, academic, and career development. It affords students

opportunities to have an impact on their campuses and in their communities by addressing challenges related to

their Honors Study Topic research. Members who participate in the development and implementation of an Honors in

Action project will be able to:

1. Create awareness of the importance of seeking out multiple perspectives to augment understanding of a real-world,

complex, interdisciplinary topic and improve decision making,

2. Demonstrate analytical and critical thinking skills to draw research conclusions,

3. Initiate real-world problem-solving by developing an in-depth, action-oriented solution to make a difference for a

challenge related to their Honors Study Topic research,

4. Plan and set goals for each step of the Honors in Action process,

5. Develop capacities to lead, manage, and motivate self and others, to perform in complicated environments and

accomplish goals,

6. Collaborate and create effective teams to enhance project impact, and

7. Cultivate reective skills and aptitudes to assess progress, adjust to circumstances, and measure results

quantitatively and qualitatively.

Achievement of these learning outcomes builds the analytic and collaborative problem-solving and leadership skills

necessary and valued in advanced academic pursuits, workplaces, and communities.

Phi Theta Kappa Honors in Action

Honors Program Guide 3

HONORS IN ACTION

EXPLORE THE GUIDE TO GAIN AN UNDERSTANDING OF THE 2020/2021 HONORS STUDY TOPIC

AND ITS THEMES (PAGES 5-21)

• Read the Honors Study Topic essay for an overview of the 2020/2021 topic.

• Check out the seven Honors Study Topic Themes for more detail about each theme.

• Read the overarching question located below the theme title to help guide your selection of an Honors Study Topic

Theme.

• Read the introduction to the theme.

• Check out the sources in the “Discover More” Section.

READ AND ANALYZE THE HONORS IN ACTION PLANNING RUBRIC (PAGES 22-23)

• Look at the detail for each section of the rubric: Academic Investigation, Action (with collaboration), and Impact.

The rubric will guide your HIA team to set research, action, and collaboration objectives. Be sure all elements of a

strong HIA project are included in your planning and implementation.

• Remember, this is the same rubric that Hallmark Award judges use to score award entries when they are submitted.

EXAMINE HOW TO IDENTIFY AND ANALYZE ACADEMIC SOURCES (PAGES 24-26)

• Investigating academic sources related to the Honors Study Topic is the cornerstone of Honors in Action. Learn

how to determine whether a source is academically credible.

DISCOVER HOW TO DEVELOP A RESEARCH QUESTION (PAGE 27)

• Once you select one of the seven Honors Study Topic Themes, your HIA team will develop a research question.

Learn the steps to take to ensure that you have a robust question guiding your research.

LEARN HOW TO CREATE YOUR TEAM’S HIA JOURNAL (PAGES 27-28)

• Not sure how to create an effective HIA Journal? Explore the suggestions, including questions to ask yourselves,

about how to create your team’s journal.

CHECK OUT THE SAMPLE HIA PROJECT (PAGES 29-31)

• Members of the Honors Program Council have provided a sample HIA project based on the 2020/2021 Honors

Study Topic.

How to Use This Honors Program Guide

4 Honors Program Guide

INVESTIGATE AND ANALYZE

Review the Honors Program Guide and

develop research objectives to guide

your in-depth academic research into

a specic theme related to the current

Honors Study Topic.

STRATEGIZE AND LEAD

Consider how your research

ndings manifest locally, identify a

real-world problem related to your

academic research that requires

action, and brainstorm possible

solutions to the problem.

Identify collaborators

on campus and in

the community and

execute the plan of

action.

Execute your

plan of action.

ASSESS AND REFLECT

Reect on and evaluate your

academic research, action,

and project collaboration.

Assess teamwork and

how members grew as

scholars and leaders

throughout the Honors

in Action process.

Write, edit, and submit

your team’s Honors in

Action Hallmark Award

entry.

Develop a plan of action to

address the local problem

identied by Honors Study

Topic research ndings.

Develop a research

question to guide

your Honors Study

Topic investigation.

Investigate academic

sources with varied

viewpoints related to

your research question.

Reect on and analyze

your research to develop

research conclusions.

Honors in Action projects require substantive academic

investigation of a theme related to the Society’s current

Honors Study Topic. The theme you select should be

directly connected to and provide supporting evidence

for the development of the action component of your

project. Honors in Action projects require you to address

a need in your community that was discovered through

your research and analysis into the Society’s current

Honors Study Topic.

HONORS IN ACTION

Set action and

collaboration

objectives.

Set research

objectives.

START HERE

Honors Program Guide 5

To the Seventh Generation: Inheritance

and Legacy

By Susan Edwards

Associate Vice President, Honors Programming and Undergraduate Research, Phi Theta Kappa Honor Society

There’s a history through her

Sent to us as a gift from the future

To show us the proof

More than that, it’s to dare us to move

And to open our eyes and to learn from the sky…

And live like we’re still alive

~ Sara Bareilles

What did we inherit from our ancestors, and what legacy

can we leave for future generations? Sara Bareilles, in her

2013 song “Chasing the Sun,” pondered life on a grand

scale. Bareilles sang, “It’s a really old city, stuck between

the dead and the living, so I thought to myself sitting on

a graveyard shelf, as the echo of heartbeats, from the

ground below my feet, lled a cemetery in the center

of Queens.” She contemplated the names and dates of

people buried there and concluded from the symphony

of their heartbeats that life is meant to be meaningful. We

can try our best. We can chase the sun. Our hopes, dreams,

fears, and challenges are meaningful when placed in the

context of our ancestors and descendants to the seventh

generation and beyond. Like Bareilles, Amelia Earhart

argued that we should chase our dreams. “The most

difcult thing,” Earhart said, “is the decision to act. The

rest is merely tenacity.”

Ojibwe culture is credited with the concept of thinking

about decisions with the seventh generation in mind. The

Ojibwe are part of the Haudenosaunee who believe they

are connected to the rst people who walked on Earth and

to those people who are yet to be born. According to Rick

Hill, Sr., Tuscarora of the Beaver clan and former Special

Assistant to the Director of the Smithsonian’s Museum of

the American Indian, people living today are the bridge

between ancestors and descendants. To Hill, “We inherit

a duty, we inherit a responsibility…Don’t just come here

expecting to benet. You come here to work hard so

that the future can enjoy that benet.” To Oren Lyons,

Onondaga Faithkeeper of the Turtle Clan of the Seneca

Nations, it is vital to think about people beyond your

generation so that they can enjoy the culture, way of life,

and preservation of the land your generation inherited.

In a 2006 interview with the Public Broadcasting System’s

Christine Turner, Bill Moyers discussed his play, The Seven,

an adaptation of Aeschylus’ tragedy, Seven Against Thebes

(476 B.C.E.). Both plays explored the idea that generations

have questioned whether they control their destinies or

whether destiny is out of their control. Moyers argued that

every generation has grappled with what they inherit from

their ancestors and what they will leave behind. He told

Turner that he had come to the conclusion that his legacy

would be love – that he tried to make decisions based on

love, rather than on fear.

Columnist Charles Blow wrote about legacy and children in

a 2019 New York Times piece. We strive, Blow contended,

to teach children “how honor and integrity are constructed,

maintained, and defended. We want to raise good people

and good citizens, people who respect society and follow

the rules, though not blindly. We want them to question

the world, and if they identify injustice, work to eliminate

it.” When the United States Women’s Soccer Team won

the 2019 World Cup, the Nike Corporation released a

television commercial with a powerful message about

legacy. In it, the narrator expressed the hope that, “a whole

generation of girls and boys will go out and play and say

things like, ‘I want to be like Megan Rapinoe when I grow

up,’ and they’ll be inspired to talk and win and stand up

for themselves.” How do we raise children who thrive

and who understand their connection to ancestors and

responsibilities to generations that follow them?

Humans have long been interested in their place in the

universe, but perceptions have uctuated over time as

scientists built on legacies left by scholars who came

before them. Ancient and Medieval peoples sought

ways to explain the cosmos and believed it was ruled

by supernatural beings, the Earth was at, and planets

revolved around the Earth. As scientic astronomy

developed, so did new understandings of the cosmos. Two

comets helped advance what humans understood about

natural and constructed environments. In 1543, Nicolaus

Copernicus determined that the Sun, not Earth, was at

the center of the universe. He believed that the universe

was composed of crystalline spheres, and scientists who

followed Copernicus found his arguments compelling. In

Denmark, Tycho Brahe thought that knowledge of how

the cosmos worked could help predict events on Earth.

As the king’s astrologer, Brahe was given one percent of

Denmark’s budget to create the world’s best observatory.

When in 1577, a great comet passed close to Earth for two

months and was seen around the world, Brahe tracked

its trajectory through the orbit of Venus. Brahe noted

that crystalline spheres should have stopped the comet.

Logically, then, the spheres did not exist.

6 Honors Program Guide

Johannes Keppler, a German scientist who worked

in Prague and who also witnessed the 1577 comet,

argued that religious and ancient ideas about the

cosmos should be discarded. Empirical observation, he

believed, should be the basis for understanding science.

Keppler recalculated Brahe’s precise calculations to

determine that planets moved in ellipses, rather than

circles. Working in 17th-Century England, Isaac Newton

added that studying the universe in a holistic way would

help science reveal God’s master plan. Another comet,

this one in 1680, would be seen during the day and

reappeared in 1681. Newton concluded that gravity

surrounding the Sun had caused the comet to travel in an

elliptical motion and that gravity was the glue that held

the universe together. The work done by Copernicus,

Brahe, Keppler, and Newton laid groundwork for siblings

Caroline Herschel and William Herschel to build powerful

telescopes in the 18th Century, Albert Einstein’s Theory

of Relativity, Georges Lemaître’s recalculation of Einstein’s

theory to show the universe was expanding, and Edwin

Hubble’s 100-inch telescope. Their work has, in turn, led

to the development of the Extremely Large Telescope

(ELT). The ELT is under construction in Chile’s Atacama

Desert and will allow 13 times more light than older

telescopes (100 million times more light than human eyes

can naturally see).

Dr. Alexandra Amon, astrophysicist and observational

cosmologist at Stanford University, has said that we know

only ve percent of the observable universe. Continuing

to measure what is going on in the universe is the only

way to understand the cosmos and how it relates to the

human experience. The legacies of these scientists and

artisans will inspire 21st-Century explorers and innovators

as they examine more than 100 billion galaxies currently

known to exist.

Singers, songwriters, and business people have explored

the building blocks of human experience through country

music stories. The country music industry annually pulls

in more than two billion dollars and accounts for nearly

35 percent of the recorded music industry’s revenue

in the United States. Its popularity is global. There are

Hank Williams cover bands in Spain, saddle-topped

barstools in the Czech Republic, and line dancing halls in

Argentina. In Iran, the Dream Rovers, Shahryar Masrour,

and Thunder are melding American country music with

traditional Iranian tunes. Filmmaker Ken Burns studied

the history of country music for his 2019 documentary

series and found that the industry had created a unique

relationship with fans. The Carters, considered the rst

family of country music whose legacy is considered

the foundation for the rest of country music’s artists,

initially stayed in fans’ homes to save money when they

toured. Stars like Dolly Parton, Charley Pride, Garth

Brooks, Keith Urban, and Blake Shelton, who followed

the Carters, regularly participated in fanfests, spending

hours signing autographs and posing for photographs

that helped them connect with the people who listened

to and purchased their music. Ernest Tubb, another of

the pioneers of country music, known as the “Texas

Troubadour,” explained, “We built this industry one

handshake at a time.”

Burns found that country had its roots in many music

traditions, blues, jazz, hillbilly, as well as the United States

immigrant experience. Singer-songwriter Rhiannon

Giddens’ inuences included strong women like Reba

McEntire, Mary Chapin Carpenter, and Kathy Mattea

who continued the legacy of strong female stars set

by Sara and Maybelle Carter. Giddens appreciated

that, “Jazz emphasizes this, blues emphasizes this,

country emphasizes this, but they are all part of the

American music pot. It’s America, but it’s got Africa in

it.” Songwriter Harlan Howard, who wrote more than

4,000 songs and who was called “the Dean of Nashville

songwriters” by Rolling Stone, explained in song the

appeal of country music. It is “Three Chords and the

Truth.”

Thirteenth-Century theologian Thomas Aquinas

synthesized the philosophy of Aristotle with the teachings

of the Roman Catholic Church and saw reason and

revelation as complementary means of knowing truth.

Aquinas realized the value in listening to expressions of

truth articulated by all people. He believed, “We must

love them both, those whose opinions we share and

those whose opinions we reject, for both have labored in

the search for truth, and both have helped in nding it.”

To what extent is honoring others’ opinions still desirable

and possible in a seemingly polarized, post-truth world?

What legacies do we build when we search for and

express truth?

Harriet Tubman had a vision for her life based on the truth

that, as journalist Sheryl WuDunn has argued, the greatest

injustice of the 19th Century was slavery. Tubman said, “Every

great dream begins with a dreamer. Always remember, you

have within you the strength, the patience, and the passion to

reach for the stars to change the world.” Tubman’s truth was

expressed through her active resistance to the institution of

slavery. James Baldwin who wrote about the legacy of slavery

and the human condition, expressed his truth, “It took many

years of vomiting up all the lth I had been taught about

myself, and half-way believed, before I was able to walk on the

earth as though I had a right to be here.” He left a legacy of

resistance, great literature, and inspiring words for people like

Billy Porter, who paraphrased Baldwin in his acceptance speech

when, in 2019, Porter became the rst openly gay man to win

an Emmy Award for Best Actor in a Drama Series.

Duchess Harris, alumna of the Mellon Mays Undergraduate

Fellowship Program and Professor and Chair of the American

Studies Department at Macalester College, wanted people to

think about inheritance and legacy. Her interest in inheritance

and legacy was the impetus to explore her grandmother’s

history as one of NASA’s earliest female mathematicians.

Miriam Mann worked on the Friendship 7 project, and Harris

created her “Human Computers at NASA” digital archives

project to highlight the work and heritage of women like Mann.

Along with the global legacy of slavery, WuDunn argues that

the greatest injustice for the 21st Century is global gender

inequality. She has argued that in the West, there are more

women than men because women have

access to food and health care.

As a result, they live longer

than did their ancestors.

Demographers have

determined, though,

that there are

between 60

million and

100 million

missing females in the rest of the global population. WuDunn

explained that there are several reasons for having fewer

women worldwide. Over the past 50 years, more girls were

“discriminated to death” than all people killed in 20th-Century

wars. Advancements in sonograms have meant rises in the

number of abortions of female fetuses in resource-scarce

areas of the world. And, after the rst year of life when most

children worldwide breastfeed, girls are fed less food and more

often than boys die of starvation. Education and economic

opportunity for females, WuDunn argued, is key to ghting

overpopulation and pervasive poverty and leaving a legacy for

future generations.

In Amor Towles’ A Gentleman in Moscow (2016), the character

Richard Vanderwhile mused, “I guess the point I’m trying

to make is that as a species we’re just no good at writing

obituaries. We don’t know how a man or his achievements

will be perceived three generations from now, any more than

we know what his great-great-grandchildren will be having

for breakfast on a Thursday in March. Because when Fate

hands something down to posterity, it does so behind its

back.” While we may not know how our achievements will

be perceived generations from now, we can, to quote Sara

Bareilles, “chase the sun” and do our best to learn from the

past, to make life meaningful, to take responsibility for our

actions, to be tenacious in our efforts, and to leave the best

possible legacy to the seventh generation. Aandi ezhaayan?

(Where are you going?)

Honors Program Guide 7

8 Honors Program Guide

The Heirs of Our Ways

How do we acknowledge our inheritance and support children in ways that promote

humanity’s greatest potential?

By Dr. Patricia D. Hall

Honors Program Council, Phi Theta Kappa Honor Society

The United Nations Educational, Science, and Cultural

Organization (UNESCO) in The Convention on the Rights

of the Child (1995) proposed a world in which “each child

... should grow up in a family environment, an atmosphere

of happiness, love and understanding,” and they “should

be fully prepared to live an individual life in society ...

brought up in the spirit of peace, dignity, tolerance,

freedom, equality, and solidarity.” UNESCO’s proposed

world contrasts with that of detained migrant children on

the United States-Mexico border, sex workers in India,

child waste pickers worldwide, and children with lead-

based brain damage in Flint, Michigan.

Current science corroborates the UNESCO vision: children

thrive in loving, long-term, reciprocal relationships with

family, caregivers, teachers, and peers. At birth, the

human brain is 25 percent of its adult size, and it grows to

85 percent by age three. The corpus callosum achieves

its maturity in a person’s mid-twenties. For children to

grow optimally, they need access to challenging and

safe experiences in stable communities as well as access

to education, healthy food, air, and water. If all goes

well, children become self-motivated, happy, productive

members of their communities.

Clarkson, Morrisette and Régallet (1992) note that

traditional indigenous cultures view the rights of the child

differently from prevailing western cultures. Their beliefs

emphasize that the survival of the group is tantamount,

and that everyone has a unique contribution to make

to society. While indigenous cultures recognize children

have unique needs for protection and support, children

are incorporated into collective work as their skills and

abilities grow. By contrast, western cultures emphasize the

satisfaction of material wants, and that stress on material

wants may have led to increasingly consumer-oriented

societies. In the West, nuclear families are the norm, and

day-to-day life includes measures of competition for

scarce resources among and within family units. With the

mechanisms of the state and the market geared toward

production and accumulation, according to Clarkson,

Morrisette, and Régallet, the fulllment of individual

needs is the measure of success. As the global population

adopts this western denition of success, a variety of

implications for childhood have emerged.

Census data from The Opportunity Atlas shows that where

children are born makes a difference in their lives. Zip

codes establish a geofence that identies socioeconomic

status and creates a predictor of major life outcomes.

Projected lifespan, income, incarceration rate, and college

graduation can all be affected. Infant mortality for non-

Hispanic Blacks in the United States, for example, is on

par with conict zones in Syria and the West Bank. For a

variety of reasons, child and adolescent mental illness,

along with suicide rates, is increasing. With urbanization

and regional mobility, infants and children experience

institutional care outside the home in a consumer-funded

system that emphasizes access over quality.

The capacity for us to improve major life outcomes for

children is strong. Industrialized countries, including

Sweden and New Zealand, have invested in community-

supported early education and family programs. Genetic

modication promises the potential to eliminate common

childhood diseases. Technology in education allows

individualization that supports creativity and innovation.

Teens, like Swedish environmental activist Greta

Thunberg, and Parkland High School gun control activist

David Hogg, have high levels of resilience and continue

to thrive in the face of adversity. “Dreamers” show the grit

necessary to navigate the immigration system that also

serves them well in education systems and workplaces.

From ancestors we have inherited wisdom and problems

to solve before they are passed to our children and future

generations. We can learn by listening to lessons shared

by experts in neuroscience, child development, cultural

anthropology, technology, and trauma-informed family

support systems to create healthy communities in which

children thrive. What legacy will we leave children? How

can we ensure our legacy creates opportunities for

all our children to ourish in ways that allow them to

leave a brilliant legacy for the seventh generation?

THEME 1

Honors Program Guide 9

Discover More

Aldy, J. E. (2016). Mobilizing political action on behalf

of future generations. The future of children, 26(1),

157-178. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/

stable/43755235

Aldy analyzed current efforts to ght climate change

at a national and global level, and how our failure to

mobilize sufcient effort will affect future generations.

He suggested linking climate change with other issues

that affect children to potentially diminish political

opposition.

Copeland, W. E., Shanahan, L., Hinesley, J., Chan, R.

F., Alberg, K. A., Fairbank, J. A., van den Oord,

E. J. C. G.& Costello, E. J. (2018, November

9). Association of childhood trauma exposure

with adult psychiatric disorders and functional

outcomes. JAMA Network Open (7), 1-11.

Retrieved from https://jamanetwork.com/journals/

jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2713038

Copeland and his colleagues shared highlights of their

longitudinal study about the lifelong consequences of

childhood trauma.

Darling-Hammond, L. (2017). Teacher education around

the world: What can we learn from international

practice? European Journal of Teacher Education,

40(3), 291-309. Retrieved from https://www.

researchgate.net/publication/285681149_Teacher_

education_around_the_world_What_can_we_

learn_from_international_practice

Darling-Hammond surveyed varied global

education movements to nd practices that can

be used to best educate children to thrive in

the world.

Gopnik, A. (2009). The philosophical baby: What

children’s minds tell us about truth, love, and the

meaning of life. New York, NY: Farrar, Straus and

Giroux.

Gopnik explained the cutting-edge scientic and

psychological, neuroscientic, and philosophical

research that has revealed that babies learn more,

create more, care more, and experience more than

we could ever have imagined.

Lally, R. (2013). For our babies: Ending the invisible

neglect of America’s infants. New York, NY:

Teacher’s College Press, Columbia University.

Lally examined the needs of babies and their families

and the effects of U.S. policies on children’s brains,

behavior, and learning capacities.

10 Honors Program Guide

Natural and Constructed Environments

To what extent are natural and constructed environments uctuating, and how can we

intentionally interact with them to affect our legacy?

By Dr. Mitch Stimers

Honors Program Council, Phi Theta Kappa Honor Society

A natural environment, constructed without human

assistance, has always surrounded us. Only in recent

history have we signicantly modied this global

space through technological advancements, altering

one environment to create the other. Now, whether in

symphony or cacophony, both natural and modied

environments are entangled with the whole of life.

Fluctuations in systems are not the exception but the

rule. The second law of thermodynamics, for example,

describes how the propensity of a physical system to

break down is inevitable. Change, then, is inevitable.

This law, when read as a general narrative on change

rather than as a specic description of the proclivities of

heat and energy, informs us that no system is immune

to perturbations. Yet, it is future generations who will

realize the legacy of today’s exchanges with natural and

constructed environments, just as we have inherited the

consequences of past decisions and actions.

Conversion of natural landscapes into dense and

impermeable urban complexes, and the ever-expanding

need to convert forests and grasslands to productive

agricultural elds, continues to amend life and its agencies

and operations across the lithosphere, hydrosphere,

and atmosphere. The loss of arable land to erosion

and pollution poses a looming threat to the ability to

produce food. Simultaneously, food waste, caused by

consumption and distribution issues, is also a concern.

There is, as well, increased magnitude, frequency, and

intensity of some slow- and rapid-onset natural disaster

types. Destructive interaction between the natural and

human-constructed harbors the potential to affect millions

more people annually than people and animals historically

have experienced. Climate and environmental change

is altering the world, our perceptions of it, our place in

it, and perhaps geologic time itself – welcome to the

Anthropocene.

Articial intelligence (AI) is radically and rapidly altering

how even one generation ahead of us will interact with

machines and global digital networks. In 2017, Google’s

AlphaZero AI was trained in chess for nine hours, having

been programmed with only the rules of the game. All

strategy was learned by the AI. AlphaZero went on to

outperform the Stocksh 8 chess program, the best non-AI

chess engine in the world at the time. In a span of time

roughly matching a standard workday, a machine learned

and mastered one of our most complex games.

According to historian and futurist Yuval Harari, the

potential death of liberalism; a range of philosophical

visions about liberty, consent of the governed, and social

justice that Harari sees as the last “human story,” might

leave our political and social systems in a state of disarray.

If that happens, we will require an entirely new story to

help us understand our world. Recent movements of

nationalism by some of the largest and most economically

important countries are challenging the ways in which

citizens, both internally and externally, will interact with

others, as well as the natural environment, for decades.

Our alterations of natural environments and the expansion

of built environments stemming from actions just two

or three generations past are now coming into view.

Systems we have built to support life, society, and

economies are shifting daily. Eminent scientist James

Lovelock’s Gaia hypothesis portends that we are

part of one global organism, and understanding

both natural and constructed environments,

and our relationship to them, is vital should

we wish to continue this story to the

seventh generation.

THEME 2

Honors Program Guide 11

Benyus, J. M. (1997). Biomimicry: Innovation inspired

by nature. New York, NY: William Morris.

Benyus investigated what she considered nature’s best

ideas, such as spider silk and prairie grass, to determine

how humans can be inspired to adapt and innovate in

ways that support their survival.

Diamond, J. (2011). Collapse: How societies choose to

fail or succeed: (2nd ed.). New York, NY: Penguin

Group.

Diamond explored the downfall of some of the world’s

great civilizations, the characteristics of their natural

and constructed environments, and the choices they

made that led to their downfalls and legacies for future

generations.

Goodell, J. (2017). The water will come: Rising seas,

sinking cities, and the remaking of the civilized

world. New York, NY: Little Brown.

Goodell combined anecdotes with expert analysis

from around the globe to consider the effects of

environmental change on natural and constructed

environments today and for future generations.

Lovelock, J. (2016). A rough ride to the future. New

York, NY: Harry N. Abrams.

Lovelock explored the idea that climate change

may not be caused by greedy and destructive

humans but, instead, it is the result of the

constructive chaos of changing constructed

environments.

Quinn, D. (1995). Ishmael: A Novel. New York, NY:

Bantam.

Quinn constructed a ctional world in which the gorilla

Ishmael teaches the narrator of the novel about humans’

place in the world.

Ripple, W. J., Wolf, C., Newsome, T. M., Galetti, M.,

Alamgir, M., Crist, E., Mahmoud, M. I., & Laurance,

W. F. (2017). World scientists’ warning to humanity:

A second notice. BioScience, 67(12), 1026–1028.

Retrieved from https://academic.oup.com/

bioscience/article/67/12/1026/4605229

The authors updated the warning to humanity

written more than 25 years ago by the Union of

Concerned Scientists and signed onto by more than

1,700 independent scientists, including many Nobel

Laureates. They argued we have a responsibility to serve

as stewards of the Earth for future generations.

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12 Honors Program Guide

Trade, Crasmanship, and Industry

How have inherited practices of trade, craftsmanship, and industry shaped our world,

and what legacies will we inspire?

By Prof. Steven J. Fritts

Honors Program Council, Phi Theta Kappa Honor Society

Our world is a global marketplace where goods and

services are bartered, bought, sold, and traded.

Exchanges occur between friends and strangers, in souks

and contemporary open-air malls, across borders, and

on global computer networks. What vestiges of trade,

crafts, and industry remain that our ancestors would

recognize? To what extent has quality craftsmanship

remained a constant from one generation to the next?

As society progresses and needs grow, how do artisans

and craftspeople respond? To what degree is industry

connected to and still primarily driven by craftsmanship?

To what extent has efciency become the goal of the

contemporary world? How can craftsmanship and

efciency work in tandem to produce quality products and

a thriving global economy? Answers to these questions

help us consider practices we have inherited and how

they have shaped our world, as well as the legacies we will

leave to future generations.

Since they lacked many natural resources, Ancient

civilizations used the Tigris, Euphrates, Nile, Indus, and

Yellow Rivers to practice bartering and develop trade

routes to gain items they needed to sustain their society.

After 1,000 B.C.E., Mesopotamians used camels to trade

over land. From the 1st Century B.C.E. to the 13th Century,

the Silk Road connected China to the Roman Empire.

That connection helped spread knowledge, technology,

religion, the arts, and, unfortunately, the Black Death

throughout the world. Pathways such as the Spice Route

and the Via Salaria also helped global culture and trade

spread. Today, digitally-monitored land and sea routes

produce data to improve the efciency and speed with

which nations and companies can trade with one another.

Data itself, along with stocks, bonds, cryptocurrency, even

professional sports draft processes, have become tradable

commodities. The evolution of trade is coupled with a

return to bartering through sites like eBay, Craigslist,

BabysitterExchange, and SwapThing.

Throughout history, artisans’ works of mastery, more

masterpieces of the soul than simply works, reect

centuries of tradition as well as impetus for trade. We

see craftsmanship in the fragrance houses of France

established by Marie Antoinette. When he bought the

House of Lubin, Gilles Thevenin found a vial of and recipe

for the last perfume worn by the French queen before

she faced the guillotine. Marie Antionette’s legacy can be

seen as well in haute couture in the queen’s Marchande

du Mode, Marie-Jeanne “Rose” Bertain, whose vision

of haute couture for her more than 1,500 wealthy clients

created international fashion trends. The skill of Goorin

Brothers milliners, the artistry of meat cutters, and the

mastery of craft brewers have left legacies of beauty

and excellence. Craftsmanship can be found, too, in the

simplicity of a computer program, the complexity of a

cathedral, and the beauty of a bespoke suit. Mastery

of crafts is exhibited as well in the detail of cobblers’

work, the creativity of graphic novels, and the grace of

professional athletes. Craftspeople have left legacies that

have inspired generations. Are the care and artistry with

which they have operated being lost to automation and

a contemporary desire for efciency, low cost, and mass

production? What effects has the rise of industry had on

craftsmanship?

Industry and manufacturing were born of necessity and

ingenuity. Demands for mass-produced, affordable

products grew. Industry rose to meet the needs of

consumers. The rise of power and transportation

industries, for instance, fueled the economy. New trade

routes were developed with the advent of railroads,

aviation, and over-the-road trucking. However, creating

railroad engines, tracks on which trains could run, and

towns along routes led to the loss of 6,600,000 trees by

1890 which, in turn, affected the lives of millions in both

positive and negative ways. Economies ourished and

markets rose and fell. Understanding the legacies of trade,

craftsmanship, and industry allows us to consider their

impact on future generations. Are we experiencing a new

industrial revolution? How will trade through hyperloops,

space travel, and new disciplines of craftsmanship and

industry shape the future and affect our legacies?

THEME 3

Honors Program Guide 13

Lacroix, C., Tétart-Vittu, F., Trubert-Tollu, C., Martin-

Hattemberg, J., & Olivieri, F. (2017). The House of

Worth: 1858 - 1954: The birth of haute couture.

London, England: Thames and Hudson.

The House of Worth is a detailed examination of the

birth and evolution of high fashion from the era of Marie

Antoinette to the mid-20th Century.

Liu, X. & Shaffer, L. N. (2007). Connections across

Eurasia: Transportation, communication, and

cultural exchange on the Silk Roads. New York,

NY: McGraw Hill.

Liu and Shaffer examined the history of the Silk

Roads trading routes and their impact on the lands,

communications, religions, arts, and economies of

people who lived along the routes.

Morris, C. R. (2012). The dawn of innovation: The rst

American Industrial Revolution. New York, NY:

PublicAffairs.

Morris presented a detailed history of the

rst American Industrial Revolution and its

impact on trade, the economy, and living

conditions for people affected by its reach.

McKibben, B. (2006). The age of missing information

(reprint ed.). New York, NY: Random House.

McKibben explored the assumption that, with the vast

amount of information that is bombarding us with the

advent of technology, we are better informed than past

generations.

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14 Honors Program Guide

Expressions of Truth

In what ways do inherited expressions of truth build lasting legacies?

By Prof. Cassandra Powell and Dr. Terri Ruckel

Honors Program Council, Phi Theta Kappa Honor Society

Roman mythology locates Veritas (Truth), the daughter

of Chronos (Time), at the bottom of a dark, deep well,

usually clothed in a virginal white gown but now and

then wearing nothing at all. In other words, Truth is

seldom naked, usually out of reach, and always the

daughter of time.

In one of Aesop’s Fables, a man journeying through

the wilderness encounters the goddess of truth and

questions why she lives so far from the cities. She replies,

“Among the people of old, lies were found among only

a few, but now they have spread throughout all of human

society!” Do “the city” and “modernity” send the truth

into exile, so much so that the traveler encounters truth

only by accident?

In a world of “alternative facts,” Orwell’s 1984, and

ever-changing revisionist stories, how do these ancient

tales conrm or confront understandings of present-day

expressions of “truth”? What compelling stories are we

telling? What do they owe to the past, and how will they

leave something of value upon which future generations

could build?

History is replete with expressions of truth we have

inherited. In 213 B.C.E., Emperor Qin Shi Huang ordered

fenshu kengru, the burning of the Confucian scholars’

books, in order to legitimize his mandate to obliterate

the works of people with whom he did not agree. That

behavior sealed his legacy of destruction. Qin was also

said to have scholars buried alive, though new evidence

suggests that charge may be apocryphal. Copernicus

discovered the truth about the solar system but feared

publishing it during his lifetime. In 1521, the Diet of

Worms convened to determine the fate of Martin Luther.

Luther warned that it was unsafe to go against one’s

conscience. His truth led to his condemnation as an

outlaw. Thomas Jefferson based his ideas about self-

evident truths, such as the right to pursue happiness,

from John Locke’s trilogy of rights: life, liberty, and

property. Abigail Adams pressed her husband as he and

fellow Congressmen considered the extension of rights

in the United States to be more generous than their

ancestors had been to women.

At great personal risk, Harriet Ann Jacobs left us her

memoir, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl. How have

authors such as Maryse Condé, Alice Walker, and

Toni Morrison been enriched by Jacobs’ legacy? How

have they taken that inheritance and left a legacy for

generations of writers who will follow them?

Not all truths have been expressed in written form.

Protestors in Tiananmen Square and the photographers

who captured their non-violent acts inspired the world.

Neil Armstrong’s “giant leap for mankind” supported

the contemporary truth that innovation and progress can

help humans achieve seemingly impossible tasks. The

activist Banksy expresses his truth through his distinctive

art meant to “snatch away” power from well-equipped

enemies. Banksy’s work has satirized oppression in

Palestine, hypocrisy in politics, and capitalistic greed

in England. The late Tupac Shakur expressed his truth

through song, and his work continues to outsell other

artists in his music genre.

In what ways do constructed “divides” such as rural-

urban, past-present, female-male, gay-straight affect

our loyalties and inuence our perceptions of others’

expressions of truth? How much—and what—do we

owe to those who have gone before us? What do we

owe to the future? How best can we impart lasting

legacies through our own expressions of truth?

THEME 4

Honors Program Guide 15

Adichie, C. N. (2009, Oct.). The danger of a single

story [Video le]. Retrieved from https://www.ted.

com/talks/chimamanda_adichie_the_danger_of_a_

single_story

Adichie dened a “single story” as a single data point

of information that distorts understanding of cultures,

people, or history. She called for people to embrace

multiple perspectives so as to avoid being trapped in

cognitive distortions.

Austin, J. L. (1975). How to do things with words.

Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Originally a series of talks, Austin’s seminal work

developed what is now known as speech act theory.

Ayunerak, P., Alstrom, D., Moses, C., James, Sr.,

C., & Rasmus, S. M. (2014). Yup’ik culture and

context in southwest Alaska: Community member

perspectives of tradition, social change, and

prevention. American Journal of Community

Psychology, 54(1-2), 91-99. Retrieved from https://

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4119478/

The authors presented an ethnographic account of

Alaskan Yup’ik communities, illustrating how people

in indigenous communities have reacted to the

transformation of their language ecology in the tide of

global language endangerment.

Baldwin, J. (Ed.). (2018). Navigating post truth and

alternative facts: Religion and science as political

theology. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littleeld.

Baldwin edited a series of essays by scholars

whose work investigated how science, religion,

and political theory intersect and inuence

each other.

Brooks, D. (2015). The road to character. New York,

NY: Thorndike Press.

Brooks examined how people across the globe develop

character beyond individual success.

Sheen, N., Smith, H., Kenworthy, E. W., & Buttereld, F.

(2017). The Pentagon Papers: The secret history of

the Vietnam war. New York, NY: Racehorse.

The Pentagon Papers, a report issued by David Ellsberg

in 1971 on the role of the U.S. government in the

Vietnam War, proved that the U.S. government lied to

the public about the nature and scope of the Vietnam

conict. The authors placed the deception within the

tradition of political environments. The Papers are now

declassied and available to the public.

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16 Honors Program Guide

Resistance – Reform, Rebellion, Revolution

What have we learned from the inherited effects of resistance, and what legacies

can we envision?

By Prof. Rahul Kane

Honors Program Council, Phi Theta Kappa Honor Society

Reverence to the past is important and so is the regard for

the future. Resistance is an oppositional act. The practice

of resistance is as intersectional as are the powers against

which resistance is mounted. Both in the past and in the

present, the dynamic nature of resistance comes from the

actors, situations, and from the forms resistance takes.

Resistance can be social, political, or economic – and

sometimes all three. It can be violent or non-violent.

Non-violent protest by Mahatma Gandhi, for example, led

to freedom of India from the British. Resistance by Rosa

Parks in Montgomery, Alabama, led to desegregation,

and resistance led by Nelson Mandela ended apartheid.

Gandhi, Parks, and Mandela had examples of effective

resistance from leaders who came before them. Thoreau’s

philosophy inuenced Gandhi, Harriet Tubman inspired

Parks, and Gandhi and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

motivated Mandela. Gandhi, Parks, and Mandela inspired

activists who came after them. Wael Ghonim helped

jumpstart the 2011 Egyptian revolution using social

media platforms. Cardiothoracic surgeon turned satirical

comedian, Dr. Bassem Youssef, used the power of social

and traditional media to give international exposure to the

same revolution. Sir Isaac Newton is quoted as saying that

If he had seen further than other men, it was “by standing

on the shoulders of giants.” Acts of resistance and

courage by young people such as Swedish climate activist

Greta Thunberg and Pakistani women’s rights in education

activist and Nobel Laureate Malala Yusafzai stand on the

shoulders of Ghonim and Youssef and others who came

before them.

Non-violent direct action has played a major role in global

resistance, and artists have been part of that tradition.

From Bankim Chandra Chatterji’s “Vande Mataram”

(1882) to Gil Scott-Heron’s “The Revolution Will Not Be

Televised,” (1970), songs and poetry have historically

supported and fueled revolution and, in turn, inspired

future generations of artists. Banksy shredded his art

as an act of rebellion against the concept of art as a

commodity. Slogans such as #MeToo and “reclaiming my

time” represent contemporary tools of resistance that can

unite people who otherwise do not know one another or

those who feel disconnected in 21st-Century social media

culture. Social media itself, when used as propaganda, can

impact people connecting with one another in righteous

protest, but it can also be used to convince people to

follow ignoble instincts.

Revolutions have the potential to change the course of

history. While they can be non-violent, revolutions have

often stemmed from or engendered violence. In 1969, the

spontaneous and violent demonstration of the Stonewall

rebellion led to LGBTQ liberation and Pride celebrations

of today. Twenty years after Stonewall, the “tank man”

of Tiananmen square led to the June Fourth incident in

which student protesters took to the streets of Beijing, and

the government, in response, declared martial law.

Scientic revolutions can originate, too, with a

single person or group of people whose ndings are

groundbreaking. The move from Newtonian physics to

quantum physics opened doors to research in energy,

computing, and medicine. Revolutions can have

unintended consequences, because, to paraphrase

economists James D. Gwartney and Richard J. Stroup, all

important decisions are made with insufcient information.

The move from Newtonian physics to quantum physics, for

instance, also led to the atomic bomb. The discovery of

dichloro-diphenyl-trichloroethane (DDT), while hailed as a

revolution in agricultural application and safety, turned out

to be a disaster that has had a devastating environmental

impact. Rachel Carson’s 1962 book Silent Spring warned

about the effects of DDT on the environment and

helped set the stage for the 21st-Century environmental

revolution. Farmers across the globe who are dealing

with environmental changes can learn from the Third

Agricultural Revolution and from Carson’s warnings to

ensure future food security.

THEME 5

Honors Program Guide 17

Berberoglu, B. (Ed.). (2018). The Palgrave handbook

of social movements, revolution, and social

transformation. London, England: Palgrave

McMillan.

This handbook included global case studies to

investigate varied social movements that have led to

revolutions. Authors discussed the origins, existences,

and challenges of revolutionary movements.

Carson, R., Darling, L., Darling, L. (2002). Silent spring

(anniversary ed.). Cambridge, MA: Houghton

Mifin Company.

Carson illustrated the dangers of commonly

used chemicals that were destroying the delicate

environmental balance. She argued that the

indiscriminate use of dangerous household chemicals

can have extensive, long-lasting, damaging impact on

the environment.

Cipresso, P., Giglioli, I., Raya, M. A., & Riva, G. (2018).

The past, present, and future of virtual and

augmented reality research: A network and cluster

analysis of the literature. Frontiers in Psychology,

9, 2086. Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.

gov/pmc/articles/PMC6232426/

This article explored the global development of the

concept, applications, and costs of articial intelligence,

virtual reality, and augmented reality as well as

technological revolutions in healthcare, entertainment,

defense, and education.

Faris, D. (2014). Dissent and revolution in a digital age:

Social media, blogging and activism in Egypt.

London, England: I.B. Taurus.

Faris documented digital events that led to and

sustained the Arab uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia. He

discussed how older methods of digital activism, such

as blogging, created and sustained a social awareness

that provided the path for a larger social media-based

revolution that ultimately toppled governments in

Tunisia and Egypt.

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18 Honors Program Guide

Perceptions of Progress

How do inherited understandings of progress guide the future?

By Prof. Lara Roemer

Honors Program Council, Phi Theta Kappa Honor Society

According to author and management consultant

Margaret J. Wheatley, “Without reection, we go blindly

on our way, creating more unintended consequences, and

failing to achieve anything useful.” Thus, we discover the

paradox of progress: “progress” is dened as forward or

ongoing movement toward a destination. What happens,

however, when that destination is unclear or when the

path deviates from its original route?

The ways in which we understand development can shape

our interaction with the larger world. While many changes

are viewed positively and embraced by large sections of

the global population, developments always create ripple

effects that may be difcult to predict.

Leo Baekeland’s development of a synthetic-based

plastic in 1907 led to the eventual creation of thousands

of new products. When Baekeland and his counterparts

invented their material, they could not have envisioned

the tons of plastic waste that would one day litter the

world’s oceans and beaches. Nor could they have foreseen

the international political ramications that would result

from that waste. Today, the United States and western

European countries face backlash from Asian nations to

whom they export tons of plastic-based trash. As a result,

Thailand, Vietnam, and Malaysia have all introduced

laws that ban foreign nations from sending trash to their

countries.

Another example of unintended consequences of

scientic progress involved Nobel Laureate Sir Alexander

Fleming. He rst discovered penicillin in 1928 and

published his ndings to the scientic community with

the assumption that its usage would be very limited. It

wasn’t until a team of researchers in England attempted

to nd a more practical use for the drug in 1939 that the

true potential of penicillin was unlocked, sparking the

beginning of a revolution in the treatment of common

illnesses using antibiotic therapies. The developments

that resulted from Fleming’s initial discovery saved

countless lives upon their deployment in World War II

and in subsequent decades. This medical progress was

overwhelmingly positive; yet because of over prescription

and misuse of these inherited developments, antimicrobial

resistant bugs, or superbugs, have been created. Both

Baekeland’s and Fleming’s discoveries demonstrate an

initial positive change that was embraced by the global

community, but each of these instances demonstrate

the need for more progress to remedy the unintended

consequences.

We should also consider as we examine perceptions of

progress across generations that one person’s denition

of progress may differ from another’s. While much of

the world has embraced the rapid and ever-changing

nature of technological development, widely seen as

being positive and progressive, some communities have

resisted. Across the world, groups like the Amish and

the Mennonites have chosen to slowly and selectively

bring technology into their communities. Some groups,

like Congo’s Mbuti tribe, have even chosen to reject all

modern forms of technology.

Based on our shared inheritance of the results of progress,

we can examine the potential legacies we will leave

for future generations through our own perceptions of

progress. When millions of African citizens have access

to cell phones but not clean water or food, what are the

actual effects of progress?

If you could see the long-term effects of projects

on which you work, and some of those effects

were negative, would you continue your work?

THEME 6

Honors Program Guide 19

Chua, A. (2004). World on re: How exporting free

market democracy spreads ethnic hatred and

global instability. New York, NY: Anchor.

Chua examined the consensus that free markets and

democracy would transform the developing world and

found, instead, that they fueled ethnic violence.

Coccia, M. & Bellitto, M. (2018). Human progress

and its socioeconomic effects in society.

Journal of Economic and Social Thought 5(2),

160-178. Retrieved from https://ssrn.com/

abstract=3219147

Coccia and Bellitto provided a lens through which

to quantify human progress and then examined the

positive and negative effects of that progress on society.

They then used metrics to provide critical commentary

on the direction of society.

Juma, C. (2016). Innovation and its enemies: Why

people resist new technologies. New York, NY:

Oxford University Press.

Juma examined historical instances in which different

groups chose to resist the adaptation of new

technologies, seeking to explain both the positive and

negative consequences of doing so.

Kennedy, P. (2011). Preparing for the Twenty-First

Century, (reprint ed.) New York, NY: Vintage.

Kennedy’s seminal book investigated the rise and fall

of powerful nations as the dawn of the 21st Century

approached. He studied wide-ranging elds including

demographics, robotics, economics, population growth,

and the rise of China as a potential superpower to paint

a vivid picture of perceptions of progress.

National Intelligence Council (2017). Global trends: The

paradox of progress. Retrieved from https://www.

dni.gov/les/documents/nic/GT-Full-Report.pdf

The focus of this publication from the National

Intelligence Council analyzed the potential impacts of

progress on the world as it moves forward. It provided

commentary on the likelihood of conict between

nations and possible ways in which the conict can be

avoided.

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20 Honors Program Guide

Life and Death

How do narratives of life and death inspire commitment to preserving inheritances

and building legacies?

By Dr. Rosie L. Banks and Dr. Johannah B. Williams

Honors Program Council and Associate Vice President of STEM and Workforce Programs, Phi Theta Kappa Honor Society

Life and death — and the stories we tell about them —

frame the realities in which we exist and encode what we

believe are our inheritances and legacies. The Apocalypse

is an explicitly Western story of our collective end that

emerges out of Christianity. Other cultures and spiritual

traditions have stories of life and death that do not

include that. The story of the Apocalypse, itself a cultural

inheritance, reects popular perceptions of the legacies

of major cultural events. The story’s ever-shifting details —

How? When? Why? Is anything left? So what? — expose

Western hopes, fears, and values. The apocalyptic stories

of the Cold War and the Vietnam conict undergird Baby

Boomer yearning and grief in Joni Mitchell’s 1970 “Big

Yellow Taxi” and John Lennon’s 1971 “Imagine.” Television

and consumeristic nihilism inspire the classic Generation

X responses in REM’s 1983, “It’s the End of the World as

We Know It” and Prince’s “1999.” Prince’s drummer Bobby

Z recalled that Prince wrote his iconic party song in 1993

after watching an HBO documentary on Nostradamus’

prophecies. The classic Millennial expression, YOLO!

(2004), speaks for itself. How do cultural events impact a

community’s legacy or reect its inheritance?

How a culture commemorates or mourns its dead tells

the culture’s story of life and relationships. If Victorians

made keepsakes of their deceased’s hair, today’s mourners

make mixtapes or frame the deceased’s tattoos. Today’s

mourners might even commit to practices that endanger

their own health: in Tanzania, researchers learned that

sleeping under bednets during funerals is discouraged

even though to not use the nets puts mourners in danger

of contracting malaria. What other cultural or communal

practices reveal community identity?

The legacies we leave behind also tell stories of our hopes

and fears. On July 21, 2019, 23-year-old Chardaye Walker’s

sudden death left a legacy of life for eight people. As

an organ donor, Walker’s gift beneted eight families in

unique parts of the world. More than half of adults in the

United States are registered organ donors, and many

others donate their bodies to medical research. For some,

creating an offspring is their most important legacy.

The desire to create life through reproduction inspires

people to go to great lengths. The popularity of assisted

reproductive technologies like egg freezing, in vitro

fertilization, surrogacy, and others proves this. To what

extent does the idea of death impact the way that we live?

Our legacies may not only be personal and tangible, but

public and emotionally-fraught. Such legacies uncovered

in our political and cultural investments expose potential

horror stories of losing our well-being, our actual lives,

and/or our perceived shares of an inheritance. The

question “Who Built America?” generates huge emotional

responses among its discussants: African-Americans,

Native Americans, and immigrants from Europe, the

Americas, Asia, and other continents. At stake is a seat at

the table where nations’ legacies are created.

THEME 7

Honors Program Guide 21

Gire, J. (2014). How death imitates life: Cultural inuences

on conceptions of death and dying. Online Readings

in Psychology and Culture. International Association

for Cross-Cultural Psychology, 6(2), 1-22. Retrieved

from https://scholarworks.gvsu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.

cgi?article=1120&context=orpc

Gire explored how various cultures dene death and

dying to argue for the importance of considering cultural

diversity in approaching and understanding grief and

mourning practices.

Horowitz, A. (2010). Inside of a dog: What dogs see,

smell, and know. New York, NY: Scribner.

Horowitz, a cognitive scientist, explored ways in which

dogs perceive and experience life.

Kübler-Ross, E. (2014). On death & dying: What the dying

have to teach doctors, nurses, clergy, and their own

families, (reprint ed.). New York, NY: Scribner.

With updated resources, Kubler-Ross’s seminal study of

life, death, and transitions introduced the ve stages of

grief and her research about ways health care and religious

professionals can best help ease humans’ transitions.

Ostwalt, C. (2016). Visions of the end: Secular apocalypse

in recent Hollywood lm. Journal of Religion

and Film, 2(1), 1-13. Retrieved from https://

digitalcommons.unomaha.edu/cgi/viewcontent.

cgi?article=1861&context=jrf

Ostwalt argued that Hollywood lms, like lm critics,

act as popular analysts of religion in society. Reviewing

Waterworld and 12 Monkeys, Ostwalt demonstrated

that such lms reveal the degree to which the lms both

“commend” the continued importance of religion in

popular culture and “critique” the particular ways in which

religious understandings show up in the same.

Sunderam S., Kissin D. M., Zhang Y., Folger, S., Boulet,

S., Warner, L., Callaghan, W., & Bareld, W. (2016).

Assisted reproductive technology surveillance -

United States, 2016 surveillance summaries. 68(4),

1–23. Retrieved from https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/

volumes/68/ss/ss6804a1.htm

The rst U.S. infant conceived with assisted reproductive

technology (ART) was born in 1981. Since then, the use of

ART to assist in human reproduction has steadily increased.

This study examined the impact of ART-related births on

the health of mothers and babies.

Discover More

22 Honors Program Guide

HONORS IN ACTION

PLANNING AND JUDGING RUBRIC

ACADEMIC RIGOR OF RESEARCH – 34 points

Research Question

5 points - The chapter developed a thoughtful, answerable

research question to guide its academic investigation of the

Honors Study Topic through one of the themes in the current

Honors Program Guide.

Research Objectives

5 points - Research objectives clearly emphasized the

importance of intentional research as the cornerstone of the

Honors in Action project.

Note: Research objectives are related to your Honors

Study Topic academic research and include, but are not

limited to, things such as the development of your Honors

in Action (HIA) team, the number of sources to review (this

can certainly be more than eight, but you choose the eight

most impactful sources to include in your Hallmark Award

entry), how the team will determine research conclusions, the

team’s reection objectives, the project timeline, and other

objectives you hope to accomplish with your HIA project.

Academic Research

5 points - The entry clearly conveys in-depth academic

research into the Honors Study Topic through one of the

Themes in the current Honors Program Guide.

Research Conclusions

5 points - The in-depth academic research clearly provided

substantial material for the chapter to carefully weigh and

consider in determining an action component to implement

that clearly addressed a nding and is directly connected to

their research conclusions. Clear, compelling evidence shows

the research activities allowed participants to strengthen

critical thinking skills.

Note: Research conclusions are what you learned and can

articulate from your substantive academic research into

PTK’s Honors Study Topic. Hallmark Award judges should

see evidence of members’ critical thinking and research

skills strengthened as a result of the chapter’s academic

research. The research conclusions lead you directly to your

chapter’s action – be sure to make it clear WHY your research

conclusions led to your specic plan of action.

Bibliography/Citations

A. Academic Sources

3 points - The chapter’s research included eight sources that

were clearly academic publications or academic interviews

with expert sources conducted in the past year by the

chapter team.

B. Sources’ Range of Viewpoints

3 points - Expert sources are clearly wide-ranging and

clearly represent different points of view about the Honors

Study Topic and the Theme selected by the chapter from the

current Honors Program Guide.

Citations

A. APA Citations Structure

3 points - The citations are written in formal, full, and

consistent APA style and structure.

B. Bibliographic Annotations

3 points - Bibliographic annotations of academic sources

provide robust evidence supporting why the source was

signicant to the chapter’s research and how the evidence

clearly related to the chapter’s research conclusions.

Spelling and Grammar

2 points - Spelling and grammar are faultless. Entry is

well-written and easy to follow.

Honors Program Guide 23

SERVICE/ACTION – 33 points

Action Objectives

5 points - Project objectives were clearly measurable and

clearly emphasized the importance of taking action or serving

AND emphasized the clearly dened proposed scope of

the project.

Action’s Connection to PTK’s Honors Study Topic

6 points - The chapter clearly shows with specic evidence

how the action was developed from the chapter’s Honors

Study Topic research conclusions.

Outreach/Collaboration

5 points - The chapter’s project (Academic Investigation

and/or Action) reached a variety of audiences including

BOTH the college and the community, and the role(s) played

by collaborators were substantive and stemmed from the

chapter’s research conclusions.

Communication

5 points - There is clear and compelling evidence that

communication among the participating individuals and/

or organizations was effective and efcient and that they

explicitly shared common objectives.

Heightened Awareness of Self and Community in Relation

to Global Issues

5 points - Solid, specic evidence is given that chapter,

college, and community participants heightened their

awareness of self and community in relation to global issues.

Increased Appreciation for Value of

Informed Action as Lifelong Endeavor

5 points - The entry provided clear, strong, and specic

evidence that participants increased their appreciation

for the value of informed action/service as a

lifelong endeavor.

Spelling and Grammar

2 points - Spelling and grammar are faultless.

Entry is well-written and easy to follow.

Honors Program Guide 23

IMPACT – 33 points

Contribution to Understanding of the Honors Study Topic

6 points - Without question, the project made substantial,

specic contributions to participants’ understanding of a

Theme as it relates to the current Honors Study Topic.

Contribution to Understanding of the Importance of

Lifelong Intentional Service

5 points - Without question, the action piece of the project

made a substantial, specic, and measurable contribution

to improving an issue determined from the chapter’s Honors

Study Topic research conclusions and within the clearly

dened proposed scope.

Contribution to Improving an Issue within the Clearly

Dened Proposed Scope

5 points - Without question, the project had signicant,

specic, short-term impact and clear potential for long-term

impact.

Research Quantitative and Qualitative Outcomes

5 points - Without question, the project’s research outcomes

were exceptional and specic for the Honors in Action time

frame, addressed the chapter’s objectives, and were both

quantitative and qualitative.

Research outcomes are related to your Honors Study Topic

academic research and research objectives and include,

but are not limited to, things such as the development of

your Honors in Action (HIA) team, the number of sources

reviewed (this can certainly be more than eight, but you

choose the eight most impactful sources to include in your

Hallmark Award entry), how the team determined its research

conclusions, how the team reected throughout the research

part of the project, how the team met its project timeline, and

how the chapter met its other research-related objectives.

Finally, how did the team determine whether members grew

as scholars and leaders?

Action Quantitative and Qualitative Outcomes

5 points - Without question, the project’s action outcomes

were exceptional and specic for the Honors in Action time

frame, addressed the chapter’s objectives, and were both

quantitative and qualitative.

Reection

5 points - Without question, the chapter assessed in an

intentional, consistent, and reective way throughout the

project what they learned, how they grew as scholars and

leaders, and how they met their proposed project objectives.

Spelling and Grammar

2 points - Spelling and grammar are faultless. Entry is well-

written and easy to follow.

Check out the latest version of the Honors in Action Hallmark Award questions and judging rubric at

https://portal.ptk.org/Programs/HallmarkAwards/HallmarkAwardCategories

Looking for examples of Honors in Action projects and Hallmark Award entries?

Check out the latest edition of Civic Scholar: Phi Theta Kappa Journal of Undergraduate Research at

https://www.ptk.org/Programs/HonorsinAction/CivicScholar.aspx

24 Honors Program Guide

Honors Program Guide 25

IDENTIFYING AND ANALYZING

ACADEMIC SOURCES

A SCREENING PROCESS FOR LOCATING GREAT

ACADEMIC SOURCES

When researching an Honors Study Topic Theme for an

Honors in Action project, members should follow an efcient

and effective method for identifying academic sources.

Given that not all academic sources are created equal, here

are some strategies for conducting research and evaluating

sources.

Finding your best academic sources should involve two to

three searches and time to review what you nd. Once you

have found academic sources, read them and take notes

about why the sources are important to your research. That

way, you will have the notes for drawing research conclusions

and writing bibliographical annotations.

PRELIMINARIES

After determining your chapter’s theme and research

question, organize key words of your research question into

appropriate search terms.

Example: The sample research question on page 29 of the

guide is the following:

Theme 4: Expressions of Truth

How might students evaluate the inherited body of

knowledge around climate change to create a legacy of

information literacy for future students?

Possible Initial Search Terms: climate change, opposition

to climate change, global warming

These terms can be searched via your library’s databases

and resources. Remember, research librarians can help

you as you search for academic sources. On the web, try

Google Scholar (https://scholar.google.com/ ) to search

for scholarly and legal sources.

In the example provided, students might also look for

specic scientists or universities whose faculty argue for

or against climate change.

FIRST SEARCH: TYPE AND RELEVANCY OF

ACADEMIC SOURCES

Type

For your rst search, use the initial search terms created by

your HIA team and review them for both the types of texts

found and their relevance. Texts can be classied traditionally

as primary or secondary sources, or, more currently, within the

context of multimodality.

What is multimodality?

Multimodality is a theory of communication and learning

that organizes knowledge into ve distinct learning modes

(semiotic groups): textual, aural, linguistic, spatial, and visual.

Multimodal educators and researchers may use two or more

modes in conducting research or in teaching and learning

processes. Multimodality is inclusive of cultural, linguistic,

communicative, and technological diversity in the world. As

communication practices have changed drastically over the

past 20 years, it is desirable, even necessary, to think of using

more than written materials for academic research purposes.

Progressively, there is a need to compose materials in formats

that are accessible to all learning styles.

The following graphic provides examples of multimodal

research tools. This graphic is not exhaustive. You may note

that the references provided both online and in the Honors

Program Guide include several different modes.

The discussion that follows applies generally to all types of

texts. When there are references to specic considerations for

specic texts, they are explicitly noted.

Textual

Written words as in books, articles,

novels, advertisements

Aural

Linguistic

Spatial

Visual

Speeches, podcasts, videos,

audiobooks, music, storytelling

Interviews, focus groups,

spoken word, speeches, books

Dance, storytelling (gestures),

graphic novels, posters

Images, media, maps, documentaries,

live performances, animation

Relevancy

“Data is inherently dumb,” proclaimed Peter Sondergaard,

head of research at Gartner, Inc., a global research and

advisory rm. “It doesn’t actually do anything unless you

know how to use it; how to act with it...” (Oliver, 2015).

Aside from type, your rst search should review the sources

found for relevance, because breaking down your research

question into potential search terms may still not yield the

most focused and useful results.

So, what are you looking for?

First, take time to determine which types of multimodal

sources might be relevant to your project. For example, if you

are researching the hidden voices of young adults in an urban

setting, then perhaps spoken word performances may be an

excellent multimodal research tool to consider along with

expert sources that help you interpret the performances. On

the other hand, if your research is about incarceration rates

in urban environments, it is highly likely that spoken word

performances may not be credible nor reliable.

As another example, you may have interesting conversations

with a friend regarding the Korean War; however, these

conversations would not be considered reliable research

about the war. Conducting an academic interview with a

veteran who had rst hand experience of the war through

service would be much more credible and reliable.

Second, review your potential sources to see whether or not

they are useful to your HIA team. That is, what information

would the source provide you that you need? By examining

titles and abstracts, you can easily determine if the source will

provide useful historical or theoretical information regarding

your topic. Perhaps the source contains an answer to your

research question with a rationale for that answer. Or, perhaps

your source surveys a number of potential responses to

your question so that you can easily see how scholars have

discussed your research question thus far.

Third, to the extent possible, you should try to determine

what the author’s purpose, overall project, or thesis is so that

you do not use the author’s work out of context or unfairly.

Lastly, once you have determined that a source is relevant, you

should scan the references to see if there are seminal sources

(works that are classic or essential to the eld) listed and scan

the document to see if there are any additional keywords that

will support you in revising and focusing your search.

26 Honors Program Guide

Honors Program Guide 27

SECOND SEARCH: CURRENCY AND

CREDIBILITY/ETHOS

Currency

Your second search should utilize the more focused keywords

and authors that you found in your rst pass in the databases

and/or Google Scholar. However, this time, do not review the

list right away. Instead, lter it so that you only search within

the last ve years, unless you are dealing with seminal works.

Occasionally, you will encounter a topic or question that no

one has researched in the last ve years. Then, of course, you

want to nd whatever is the most current research available and

gure out why no one has worked on this topic in some time.

Credibility/Ethos

Once you have ltered your list for currency, you can start to

sort for credibility. The credibility of a source depends on the

type of source being used. While the section “Type” in the

previous graphic will help your HIA team classify the sources

that you are using, also consider the following rules of thumb:

1. Books

Generally speaking, self-published books are not

considered as credible as books published by commercial

publishers and/or university presses. In terms of credibility,

university press published books rank highest, because

they tend to receive much more scrutiny from experts in a

given eld.

2. Periodicals/Journals

We are entering an era where academic knowledge

building is being increasingly democratized and digitized,

which is great. Nevertheless, greater accessibility of

information may belie its credibility. If you decide to

use open access resources, you should review them

carefully to ensure that the information has been properly

vetted by experts in the eld. Peer-reviewed research is

simply more credible.

3. Internet Domains

Researchers are encouraged to stick closely to the

domains of educational institutions (.edu) and the

government (.gov) or the military (.mil). This does not

mean that the other domains — .net, .com, .org — are

useless. They, however, require more scrutiny and review,

as discussed in the last section.

Further Review

After two distinct searches, you are now ready to read more

deeply the works that are left before you. What you are now

looking for are logical, grammatical, and intellectual errors

that may reduce a writer’s credibility even if the work passed

the tests for relevance and currency above. Some areas of

review include the following:

1) Bias – We are all biased, but when does one’s bias

override one’s credibility? One great example of this is a

site about the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. that is hosted

by NeoNazis. Again, “data is dumb” (Oliver, 2015). While

specic facts may be accurate, the overall interpretation

may be misleading.

2) Logical Fallacies – You can nd a number of websites

online that discuss common logical fallacies, such as ad

hominem (to attack a person rather than the person’s

argument) or straw man (to distort an argument so as to

more easily rebut it). Your English instructor or a librarian

or a logician can easily assist you in sorting through

articles for logical fallacies.

3) Grammatical Errors and Typos – If an author and/

or editor has not effectively edited the material,

the argument(s) proposed may not be very sound.

Researchers are encouraged to pay close attention to

such details.

4) Factual Errors – If the author’s facts are incorrect, this may

mean that their overall argument or thesis is also incorrect

or ill-informed.

REFERENCES

The Audiopedia. (2018). What is multimodality? What

does multimodality mean? Multimodality meaning &

explanation. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/

watch?v=mymp7Ep72Ho

The New London Group. (1996). A pedagogy of

multiliteracies: Designing social futures. Harvard

Educational Review, 66(1), 60-93. Retrieved

from http://newarcproject.pbworks.com/f/

Pedagogy+of+Multiliteracies_New+London+

Group.pdf

Beck, S.E., (2009). The good, the bad & the ugly: Or, why

it’s a good idea to evaluate web sources: Criteria for

evaluating sources. New Mexico State University Library.

Retrieved from http://lib.nmsu.edu/instruction_backup/

evalcrit.html

Blakeslee, S. (2004). The CRAAP Test. LOEX Quarterly,

31(3), 6-7. Retrieved from https://commons.emich.edu/

loexquarterly/vol31/iss3/4/

Heldt, T. (n.d.). Social and political dimensions of information

literacy: Readings and research skills. Harold Washington

College Library. Retrieved from http://lis101.com/

Indiana Wesleyan University. (2019). Boolean operators. Off

Campus Library Services. Retrieved from https://ocls.

indwes.edu/boole.htm

Mills, K.A. & Unsworth, L. (n.d.). Curriculum and pedagogy,

technology and education, languages and literacies.

ResearchGate. Retrieved from https://www.researchgate.

net/publication/322950599_Multimodal_literacy

National Centre for Research Methods: Economic and

Social Research Council. (2019). Glossary of multimodal

terms. Retrieved from https://multimodalityglossary.

wordpress.com/

Oliver, H. (2015). Data is dumb, it’s what you do with it that’s

smart (Or: Data is dead! Long live data!). Idealog.

Retrieved from https://idealog.co.nz/tech/2015/10/data-

dumb-its-what-you-do-it-s-smart-or-data-dead-long-live-

data

Pierce, J. (2019). Understanding sources. Leesburg, FL: Lake-

Sumter State College.

Thomas, R. (2019). Google scholar: An essential research

tool: How google scholar searches. University of Regina

Library. Retrieved from https://uregina.libguides.com/c.

php?g=606135&p=4201992

Salmons, J. (2019). Methodspace. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage

Publishing. Retrieved from https://www.methodspace.

com/multimodal-qualitative-research-study-complex-

problems/

Santa Ana College Nealley Library Pathnder. (n.d.).

Distinguishing scholarly journals from other periodicals.

DR RSCCD Publications Form 0401-031-EPM6.5.

Retrieved from https://www.sac.edu/Library/Documents/

pth%20scholarly.pdf

The Writing Lab & The OWL at Purdue and Purdue University.

(2019). Retrieved from https://owl.purdue.edu/

28 Honors Program Guide

• Start exploration of the Honors Study Topic with a broad

examination of To the Seventh Generation: Inheritance

and Legacy.

• Read and reect on introductory essay on pages 5-7.

• Read and review the 7 themes and their introductions

beginning on page 8.

• Consider themes that trigger your chapter’s curiosity and

passions.

• Discuss possible issues relevant to the themes that

genuinely interest your team and consider how those

issues relate to your campus and community.

• Explore what’s current in the national and international

news, on your campus, and in your community. You are

building contextual knowledge that will direct your team

toward a theme and help you develop a question that will

direct your initial research.

• From your contextual knowledge, use your observation

to help lead your team to a research question.

•

Explore issues within the themes. Remember, not all

issues are specically stated in the theme, as this is an

intellectual framework and a guide to provoke discussion.

As you choose a theme, consider which

theme seems most relevant to the

intellectual curiosities of your

chapter members.

• Make sure the pursuit of your intellectual curiosity is

interdisciplinary and global. Though your chapter will

likely work at the local level, be sure to initially consider

your theme through an international lens.

• From your team’s observations, begin developing research

questions by asking:

• What do we want to nd out about our research topic?

• What research have scholars conducted already?

• What remains undiscovered about this topic?

• What are the relevant and credible sources, and how

readily available are they?

• Remember, when you answer research question(s), two

important developments can happen that are normal parts

of the process:

• The scope and nature of your question can change.

• Your theme may change based on what your team nds.

• Sample Research Question:To what degree have inherited

understandings of freedom of the press guided societies

worldwide? (Theme 6)

DEVELOPING A RESEARCH QUESTION

Honors Program Guide 29

Keeping a journal throughout the HIA project is an important

tool to track what you learned, how you grew as scholars and

leaders, and how you met your proposed project objectives.

Reection is a signicant part of the HIA project rubric.

• Everyone on the HIA team should keep a journal.

• Journaling can be accomplished on paper or online (check

out Google Docs, Glimpses, Memento, etc.)

• Consider setting deadlines for reections as part of your

project timeline.

Get ready; get set; go!

• Congratulations on being a part of your Phi Theta Kappa

chapter’s Honors in Action Team! How did your chapter

choose the team, and how do you think you might grow

individually as a leader and a scholar during the process?

• What were your research objectives for the project?

• Which themes in the Honors Program Guide were most

interesting to you and why?

• How did your group choose your theme related to the

Honors Study Topic?

• Does the theme address a real-life issue in your

community?

• What are your deadlines?

If you want good answers, you must ask the right

questions, and set the right objectives.

• What are your research objectives? How did you develop

them?

• What is your research question? Is your question

thoughtful and answerable?

• Is your question directly related to one of the themes

AND the overall Honors Study Topic in the current Honors

Program Guide?

• By what process did you develop your research question?

• Who (faculty, advisors, librarians, experts) engaged in

the research and development that led to your research

question?

• What different disciplines can you connect to your theme

as it relates to the Honors Study Topic?

• What are the varied perspectives and points of view to

explore?

• What sources can you identify that represent the varied

points of view about your theme as it relates to the Honors

Study Topic?

• What are the details of your research plan (number and

type of sources, deadlines for reporting, etc.)?

HONORS IN ACTION JOURNAL

30 Honors Program Guide

What did you learn? What conclusions did your team draw?

• What academic sources did each researcher consult? What

were the three most meaningful things each researcher

learned from each source that informed your understanding

of the chosen theme as it relates to the Honors Study Topic?

• What did you learn from analyzing and synthesizing your

team’s research?

• What are your research conclusions?

• What obstacles did you face while conducting research?

How did you overcome them?

• What are the quantitative and qualitative outcomes of your

research?

• How were your critical thinking and research skills

strengthened as a result of the chapter’s academic research?

How can you provide any evidence of this growth?

• How did your academic research into the Honors Study

Topic help you better understand the world?

• How have you shared the studies, research, analysis, and

conclusions with chapter members, people on campus, and/

or community members?

• What specic plan of action did your research conclusions

lead you to choose? Explain how and why.

How did your answers change your questions?

• In what ways was your HIA research personally challenging?

• How did your answers change your questions?

• What pre-conceived ideas held by members of your team

were challenged and/or changed through the research

process?

What will you do with your newfound knowledge?

• What did you learn during the academic research phase of

your HIA project that led you to identify an action that tied

directly to your team’s research on the Honors Study Topic?

• Whom will you serve? (demographics, numbers,

location, etc.)

• How will your project serve your campus? How will your

project serve your community?

• What organizations exist locally that are engaged in actions

(service, awareness, advocacy) similar to what you aim to

do? What can you learn from their work?

• What organizations exist in the world that are engaged in

actions similar to what you aim to do? How does their work

inform yours?

• What is the specic impact you intend to make?

• What are the details of your strategies and plans?

• How are you going to measure the impact (quantitative

measures and qualitative measures)?

Reect on how knowing more helped to change you, your

chapter members, your community, and the world.

• What are the specic results and impacts of your research,

growth as scholars and leaders, and the resulting action?

• What are the reactions and feedback from the people and

organizations with whom you collaborated?

• What is necessary for your service/action project to be

sustained and grow?

• With whom did you collaborate to complete your project?

1) People on campus? 2) Community members? How

and why did you select your collaborators? How did you

communicate with them, and how did you collectively

reect on your HIA project?

• Did you meet your chapter’s initial objectives?

Honors Program Guide 31

32 Honors Program Guide

To the Seventh Generation: Inheritance and Legacy

How might students evaluate the inherited body of

knowledge around climate change to create a legacy of

information literacy for students to come?

1. Provide a brief abstract or summary of your Honors in

Action project including

a. academic research into and analysis of sources