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Welcome to the
Prentiss M. Brown Honors Community
Albion's Prentiss M. Brown Honors Program sponsors a number of
educational opportunities and special events. Our curriculum consists of
a series of four Great Issues courses in Science, Humanities, Fine Arts
and Social Sciences, and culminates with a thesis project. For a link to
descriptions of current honors course offerings
click here:
Our home is the historically significant Observatory on the north side
of the Albion College quadrangle (see photo). Honors students have
twenty-four-hour access to the Observatory building. The Observatory is wi-fi, contains a fully equipped computer room, has a comfortable
upstairs lounge in the honors thesis library, and is the site of the
primary honors seminar room and offices. Many of our social events occur in the Observatory—including movie critic
nights, rootbeer “keggers ,” Euchre tournaments, and occasional games of
trivial pursuit with honors faculty.
Several times a year, honors students take part in off-campus cultural
field trips. We have traveled to Broadway plays at a number of sites in
Michigan and have taken students to the Art Institute of Chicago
following a campus-wide PMB honors convocation on Art History. In fall
2007, we took a trip to Chicago for a day of
museum-hopping and an evening at Second City etc.. In spring 2008 we
took a mystery train dinner trip, an event with very good food.
The Brown Program sponsors an overnight first-year retreat for all
first year students the weekend after Labor day. We run mock honors
seminars and engage in preparation for our fall convocation speaker by
reading/listening and discussing the author or performer whom students
have chosen for the year. We blow off steam by performing impromptu
skits around a late night campfire (sometimes shockingly acerbic
portrayals of campus life). Upper class honors students have an opportunity
to work with new students concerning College life and success at Albion
College. Many friends are made.
There are other social and cultural events which students enjoy. Our
Midnight Dessert, just before finals, is routinely attended by more than
a hundred students. We sponsor a Welcome Back Dinner in early spring. We welcome new honors students
as well as students returning from overseas. Some twenty students who
recently traveled off-campus conversed with their colleagues
about overseas educational opportunities at Albion. For a general calendar of events
click here . We are always adding events, so
check back once in awhile!
Interested students enrolled in Prentiss M. Brown are invited to join the Honors
Council. The Council is an all-volunteer group of students who lead our
fall retreat, serve as mentors to incoming students, explain our program
at the Distinguished Albion Scholars dessert, and decide how we
will build our social program each year. To see the minutes and
agendas for Council, click here.
Prentiss M. Brown students have won a number of
prestigious awards in the last several years, including a National
Science Foundation research award, a Morris Udall award and a number of
Fulbright fellowships. The Chronicle of Higher Education
listed Albion as a College with an unusually high number of student
Fulbright scholars in the Fall of 2008.
A notable aspect of the program over the last three years is the quality
of speakers we have brought to Albion's campus. In fall 2007, the annual Prentiss M.
Brown Convocation Lecture was given by Kwame Anthony Appiah,
the Rockefeller Chair of Ethics at Princeton. Professor Appiah
discussed the topic of his latest book: Cosmopolitanism:
Ethics in a World of Strangers. His webpage is to be found at
http://www.appiah.net/
. In spring 2008, Robert
Audi spoke to the campus on the appropriate uses of religious reasons in the
public sphere. Former president of the American Philosophical
Association's Midwest Division, and former president of the Society of
Christian Philosophers, professor Audi discussed
religion and politics with a packed house In Bobbitt. In mid September
2008, distinguished professor Deborah Lipstadt of
Emory University presented the Prentiss M. Brown Convocation lecture on her role in
the internationally famous David Irving holocaust denier trial. As a
subtext, she will talk to the campus about the fallacy of believing in
the view that all perspectives must be represented in any discussion.
A signature feature of our program is the appointment
of Professors Bille Wickre and Anne McCauley as our 2009-2010 Prentiss M. Brown
Distinguished Honors Professors. You can find
descriptions of their jointly-taught fall course by clicking on "Current
Students" above and then on the fall 2009 course offerings.
Thanks for thinking about Prentiss M. Brown,
Gene Cline
Director, Prentiss M. Brown Honors Program
Professor of Philosophy
email: gcline@albion.edu
You should address any questions to our coordinator Renee Kreger at rkreger@albion.edu or 517-629-0614. Renee is a remarkably energetic and
helpful person who is known alternatively as the “Queen of Honors” and
as the “mom” of Honors.
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The Observatory,
home to the Honors Program. Click on
the image above to download a
full-size photo suitable for desktop
wallpaper. |
The site is divided into three sections:
one serving current
students, one serving prospective
students and visitors, and one serving
alumni of
the Honors Institute.
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