An Effective Honors Composition Class Improves Honors Retention Rates: Outcomes and Statistical Prestidigitation

Annmarie Guzy teaches honors composition at the University of South Alabama. This essay discusses her observation that students who took her class were more likely to complete the honors program, which led to her wondering what elements of her course might give students an edge in honors program completion. As an English professor with training in communications, rhetoric, and technical writing, she focuses assignments on discipline-specific research and argumentation from the students' majors. This insight into modes of communication in their chosen fields might aid students in constructing and writing more successful undergraduate research and capstone projects. She focuses on issues in honors education to demonstrate different types of argumentative strategies, and she supplements textbook chapters with appropriate articles from "Journal of the National Collegiate Honors Council" and "Honors in Practice." Perhaps this awareness increases students' engagement in honors education and their commitment to the program. What she does in her class helps her honors students to graduate, but their graduation rate does not dictate what she does in her class.