Seneff Honors College

Community-based learning is a teaching approach that connects classroom learning with meaningful community engagement. Through partnerships with local organizations, students apply academic knowledge and skills to real-world challenges, deepening their understanding of course content while contributing to the public good. This experiential model fosters critical thinking, civic responsibility, and personal growth, helping students become more engaged and socially aware citizens. 

In its most simple description, undergraduate research (UR) is undergraduate students learning by doing - the pinnacle of active learning. Under the guidance of a faculty mentor, students expand their knowledge through active inquiry in scholarly and discipline research processes. Valencia College offers a variety of ways for students to engage in undergraduate research, including:

• Integrated Classes - Faculty choose to integrate an undergraduate research project into a traditional course. Students gain UR recognition on their transcripts without additional college credits.
• IDH2911 - This honors course will introduce students to the process of research, tools, concepts, and resources necessary to search, evaluate, and use information in a variety of formats and subject disciplines. The focus will be to analyze and utilize information critically using a broad range of materials and interdisciplinary concepts needed for honors research and academic/professional success.
• IDH2912 - This course provides the framework through which students, under the guidance of an Honors Research mentor, will produce and present a capstone research project.

Paid summer undergraduate research opportunities (outside of Valencia College) include:

• The National Science Foundation's Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU)
• The Big Ten Academic Alliance's Summer Research Opportunities Program (SROP)
• The Leadership Alliance's Summer Research - Early Identification Program (SR-EIP)

Online Resources - Please visit the Undergraduate Research webpage to learn more information.

Partners in the Parks is a partnership between the National Collegiate Honors Council and the U.S. National Park Service to provide honors students from across the country with the opportunity to experience interdisciplinary fieldwork in some of our most iconic National Parks. Due to its interdisciplinary nature, it is open to all majors.

This opportunity has a program fee. However, you will receive a 50% discount on registration pricing because the Seneff Honors College is a member of the National Collegiate Honors Council.

In addition, there are scholarships available for Partners in the Parks participants through both the state and regional honors councils that we can help you apply for to reimburse your trip costs. Honors students at both the annual and regional honors conferences continue to say participation in Partners in the Parks is one of the highlights of their honors experience and well worth it if you’re able to attend!

You can learn more about Partners in the Parks here.