Graduation with honors

According to the current Grinnell College catalog, Each department recommends for graduation with honors those senior majors who have clearly distinguished themselves within their major field of study, subject to the approval of the Dean of the Faculty. The catalog imposes the following condition: In order to qualify for recommendation, a student must, after seven semesters of college work, have achieved at least a 3.5 grade-point average in the major field and a cumulative grade-point average of 3.4. The required seven semesters need not all be completed at Grinnell …; however, only credits completed at Grinnell and Grinnell-in-London will be used in determining grade-point eligibility.

The catalog also specifies that these are minimum standards and should not be regarded as the only criteria. For majors in computer science, the Department of Computer Science considers the following guidelines in addition to the College’s grade-point requirements:

To be considered for honors in computer science, graduating seniors must not only meet the College’s general requirements for honors but also demonstrate exceptional commitment to the discipline and its values, as evidenced by significant engagement in the department and excellence in computing-related work, both in the classroom and beyond.

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In the past, we used a much more detailed list of criteria. We have decided that such a detailed list is not appropriate. We keep it here for historical purposes. It should not be interpreted as a guideline for what needs to be done. Talk to a faculty member in the department for more details.

1. Core courses of study
   1. Completion of Computer Science 211 or Physics 220, and
   2. Completion of Computer Science 213
2. Additional course work that is not used to fulfill another requirement
   1. Completion of a 200- or 300-level course in computer science, or
   2. Completion of a statistics course at the 200-level or higher (MAT 209, 309, 335, or 336), or
   3. Completion of MAT 220 (Differential Equations), MAT 306 (Mathematical Modeling), MAT 314 (Topics in Applied Mathematics), or MAT 321 (Foundations of Abstract Algebra), or
   4. Completion of Physics 220 (Electronics), or
   5. Completion of PSY 222 (Industrial Psychology) or PSY 260 (Cognitive Psychology).
3. Participation in local activities related to computer science, judged to be excellent by department faculty; such activities might include
   1. Giving talks at Extras sessions, or
   2. Doing independent projects (totaling four credits or more) in computer science, or
   3. Carrying out research under the direction of a member of the department, or
   4. Developing a successful software package with positive assessment by department faculty.
4. Participation in the study or use of computer science outside of the department, judged to be excellent by department faculty; such activities might include
   1. Achieving a score at or above the 75th percentile on the Graduate Record Examination in Computer Science, or
   2. Receiving an award in the Mathematical Competition in Modeling, or
   3. Achieving a strong performance in the ACM Programming Competition, or
   4. Having a paper accepted by a refereed computer science journal or conference, or
   5. Developing a successful software package with positive assessment by outside referees or evaluators, or
   6. Contributing to an open-source software package or resource, or
   7. Carrying out supervised research elsewhere.