FULL NAME (including middle initial)
CS GPA
OVERALL GPA
UID
GRADUATION SEMESTER/YEAR (expected)
EMAIL ADDRESS

You will not need to make this request again in later semesters to retain your status as an honors student, assuming you maintain your GPA, even though you will receive the semesterly solicitation.

Note: A student with an XF on their transcript may stay in the honors program as long as the GPA/credit requirements above are met. But the XF must be removed by the time of graduation in order to graduate with honors.

• Be a computer science major and have a 3.5 GPA in computer science, and a GPA of 3.0 overall.
• Achieve A's in at least THREE 400-level upper level CMSC courses that are not reading-research courses (so 498A is excluded).
• Complete one semester of CMSC 390 with a grade of A.
• Complete an honors project in computer science with a CS professor or a mentor outside of the department who is approved by a CS professor. (Contact gasarch@cs.umd.edu to request approval of an outside mentor.)

If these requirements are fulfilled by the end of the 7th semester, pending the completion of the research project, the student shall have "Departmental Honors" listed on the diploma. If the requirements are not met by the end of the 7th semester, then the student may still graduate with Departmental Honors but this will not be listed on the diploma.

The project is the important thing. Your CS faculty advisor (or a CS faculty member who has approved your outside mentor) MUST email the honors director(s) (see http://www.cs.umd.edu/Honors/) to confirm that you have completed your project satisfactorily in order to graduate with honors. There are NO OFFICIAL FORMS that you need to fill out---just tell your CS faculty advisor to email the honors director(s), and you are done.

IMPORTANT: Please email the web link for your final report to the webmaster (see address at the bottom of this page) BEFORE you graduate! Also, you must hand in the honors thesis before our deadline in order to get honors (or high honors) on your transcript. Your name should be forwarded by your CS faculty advisor (or a CS faculty member who has approved your outside mentor) 6-8 weeks prior to the award of your diploma, or this will not appear on your transcript. (However, if you miss that deadline, you are still considered HONORS by our standards---you can appear on the website, etc. Employers can check this website.)

• Be a computer science major and have over 3.5 GPA in computer science, a GPA of 3.0 overall, and more than 45 credits.
• Achieve A's in at least FOUR 400 level CMSC courses that are NOT reading-research courses (so 498A is excluded).
• Complete an honors project in computer science with a CS faculty advisor or a mentor outside of the department who is approved by a CS faculty member. (Contact gasarch@cs.umd.edu to request approval of an outside mentor.)
• Receive nomination for high honors by your faculty advisor.
• Receive approval for high honors by the honors director(s).

IMPORTANT: High Honors are rarely given; the advisor's recommendation is necessary but not sufficient, and the honors director(s) make the final decision. In the rare cases that it has happened in the past, the student has done TWO honors projects or ONE that gets into a refereed conference or journal.

More specifically, please RIGHT-CLICK and SAVE this html page, edit it, and send the resulting page to bonnie@cs.umd.edu. IMPORTANT: You should email this page as plain ascii/html, not as an attachment.

• Computer Engineering (ECE) has its OWN honors program. It involves taking honors courses in ENG and doing a project. See Lisa Kiely (lkiely@eng) for details.
• Your honors project can certainly be with a Comp Sci professor, even though you would not graduate with Comp Sci honors---just as a student in the CS honors program may have a mentor from a different department.
• If you want to be on the Comp Sci Honors EMAIL list, and thus be informed of opportunties for research and of the Honors Student Pizza Lunch, thats fine with us.
• Formally you would NOT be in the `comp sci honors program' However, if you fulfil the Comp Eng requirements for honors, you graduate with honors from ECE.

EXAMPLES OF WHAT'S GOOD:

• Extend a class project in a massive way.
• Take ideas from the literature and code them up with your own enhancements.
• Survey of papers doing XXX
• Write a compiler for a new language to demonstrate some principles of interest.

EXAMPLES OF WHAT'S NOT ACCEPTABLE:

• Write a compiler (and do that in our compiler course)
• Write code for a company over the summer and hand it in.

Note: Recent honors papers can be found on the web here.

• Discuss with the honors director(s) what your interests are and he will point you to courses to take/people to talk to/ to further those interests. Then go talk with the suggested person.
• While taking a course that you like, approach the teacher toward the end of it to ask about doing a project.
• Just walk in to a professors office and talk. The worst they can do is say ``GET OUT'' :-)

The honors director(s) describe the program and goes around to people asking them what they are interested in--- a miniversion of what will happen in his office. Those students working on projects can share their experiences with the others. Faculty tell what projects they have available.

OTHER OPTIONS:

1. You can take graduate courses.
2. You can take reading courses with faculty on more advanced material.

This year, the course will be taught primarily by Gasarch, assisted by Dorr and Perlis.

In addition we might have a 1-credit seminar for graduating honors students in which they can present their work to fellow students.

1. You get to do a project and see if you like research. This might help you decide about going to grad school.
2. There will be someone on the faculty who can write a really good letter for you.
3. You get to learn material beyond the courses of your choice.
4. You get an HONORS notation on your transcript.