Honors Courses

Language, Culture, and Society

In this cross-listed course, see how language shapes identity, belonging, and power while learning digital-humanities methods, then create an original digital story combining research, narrative, audio, and visual media into a polished artifact suitable for portfolios, public presentation, and future professional work.

Public Narratives: Museum Curation and Interpretation

Become part of a working curatorial team in partnership with MOSH, researching objects, shaping an exhibition narrative, developing interpretive materials, and helping design and install a public exhibition while gaining behind-the-scenes insight into the museum profession and MOSH Genesis.

Biochemistry I

In this specialized version of Biochem I you will step inside molecular structures through virtual reality, manipulating proteins and examining drug-protein interactions in three dimensions before using biochemical evidence to predict how molecular changes might alter those interactions—an immersive introduction to the reasoning behind real-world drug discovery and design.

Pre-Medical Prep Seminar

Explore biomedical careers through direct conversations with physicians and other health professionals, research presentations, volunteer and campus opportunities, and guided preparation for the academic demands of pre-med study in any medical field other than nursing.

Trading with AI and FinTech

Bring computing and finance together by building AI-assisted trading strategies in Python, testing them against real market data, and competing through paper trading while learning quantitative analysis, responsible AI practice, collaborative development, and the realities of modern algorithmic finance.

ST: MedNexus Social Innovation Think Tank

Join an interdisciplinary, application-based think tank where student teams tackle real healthcare challenges with local nonprofit and community partners, building skills in innovation, leadership, and collaborative problem-solving while developing solutions intended to create tangible impact across Northeast Florida.

Collaborative Computer Programming / Integration of AI Tools

Learn programming through the collaborative practices of contemporary software development, rotating through team roles while using generative AI to test, troubleshoot, and refine solutions—building technical confidence while keeping students responsible for the computational thinking behind the code.

Local Economic Intelligence Lab: Monitoring, Forecasting, and Serving the Community

Join a real local economic-monitoring operation, using Jacksonville-area data, forecasting, analytics, and AI-assisted tools to produce economic indicators, visualizations, and public-facing intelligence designed for businesses, policymakers, media, and other audiences across Northeast Florida.

Introduction to Renewable Energy

Move from renewable-energy theory into authentic engineering design through AI-assisted research, MATLAB/Simulink modeling, hands-on system building, and work with real energy infrastructure, challenging students to test ideas while connecting engineering decisions to sustainability, policy, and emerging technologies.

Boss Skills in Healthcare Leadership

Develop leadership by working through realistic healthcare challenges involving staffing, budgets, ethics, and communication, while engaging industry professionals, competing in a judged team case competition, and producing professional materials and a personal leadership plan with value beyond the classroom.

Understanding the Equine: Behavior & Welfare

In this class you’ll explore how the human-horse relationship cross disciplines, then put that learning into practice through supervised barn experiences that move students from classroom study to direct observation, interaction, reflection, and applications in health and education.

Esports Live Event Management

Experience esports as a fast-growing interdisciplinary industry rather than simply competitive gaming, working across event production, technology, marketing, design, business development, and community management while helping plan and execute live experiences in a professional, team-based environment.

Honoring the Ocean

In this one-credit course partnering faculty across the state, you’ll investigate humanity’s relationship with the sea through literature, politics, and science. While learning from profs across Florida and taking that interdisciplinary study onto the water through a hands-on research-vessel expedition requiring no prior marine-science background.

Grad School Prep

Interested in graduate school but not sure where to start? In this seminar, you will learn how to navigate the entire application process, such as identifying top graduate programs in your field, pulling together documents to include in your applications, funding your graduate program, and asking for letters of recommendation. By the end of this seminar, you will have written your CV and a strong draft of your statement of purpose/personal statement.

Real World Policy

Learn how U.S. foreign policy is actually made, develop an evidence-based proposal for changing a current policy, then travel to Washington, D.C., to present recommendations to officials, congressional offices, embassies, and think tanks before translating the work into a publication-ready op-ed.

Foundations of Sales and Customer Engagement

Discover sales as relationship-building and problem-solving rather than simply persuasion through hands-on exercises, industry challenges, guest professionals, and opportunities for company engagement, site visits, and job shadowing across industries—while exploring how technology and AI are reshaping the field.

Happiness and Consumption

What can money buy? This class not only looks at the relationship between consumer behavior but investigates well-being by pairing academic study with activities such as guided yoga, guest speakers, and applied exercises, inviting students to test ideas about consumption and happiness in lived experience.

Marketing Research Information

Get a sense of legitimate marketing research by doing it for actual organizations, working as student consultants to define client questions, gather and analyze evidence, and translate findings into actionable recommendations—building experience with both the technical research process and professional, stakeholder-facing communication.

Gross Anatomy for Health Care Professionals

Study human anatomy through direct work with cadaveric specimens, connecting foundational science to clinical and surgical perspectives from medical professionals and giving students preparing for healthcare careers an unusually authentic look at the structures they will encounter in practice.

Climate Change Policy

Study environmental policy and climate change through a 10-day Spring Break experience in Brazil, traveling to Belém and the Amazon rainforest to examine deforestation and local communities before exploring Atlantic Forest conservation efforts in Rio de Janeiro.

Human Psychophysiology

Work with research-grade technology to collect and analyze real human physiological data, then join a research team to design and conduct an original empirical study from hypothesis through analysis, culminating in a research paper and public presentation at UNF’s Student Research Symposium.

Writing for FAN

Why should nurses read and study literature? What do we—and our patients—gain by learning to hear, process, and respond to stories? Narrative medicine, deemed “one of medicine’s most important internal renovations,” brings together literature and medicine to equip medical professionals with the tools they need to understand the narratives patients trust them with. In this process-based Honors writing course, students will discuss, read, research, and write about the burgeoning field of narrative medicine. Along the way, students will also learn the basics of APA-style writing and documentation as they compose a self-directed research paper on a topic in narrative medicine.

A Taste of Jax

Explore Jacksonville’s neighborhoods through its ethnic food scene and immigrant history. Students will learn about Jacksonville through readings, research, in-class tastings, collaboration with international students, and a series of side quests: in-person explorations of different areas of the city. Bring your adventurous taste buds, let me know about any food allergies, and be prepared for some fun field trips.

Place-Based Writing for Immersive Technologies

This course asks students to spend time working with immersive technology and the outdoors. Using UNF’s nature trails and gardens, students will practice place-based writing for a 360-degree guided photo tour, incorporating both their experiences and research about the place. Students will explore different ways of knowing, listening, researching, and composing while working with multimedia. No immersive-media experience is needed; students will learn no-coding software and library resources.

Vampire Studies

In this vampire-themed research and writing course, each of us will choose a vampire to research, writing the final synthesis paper on what deep-rooted anxieties or repressed desires they may represent, and why they are still revenant—erm, relevant!

Writing About Film

Do you enjoy watching movies and talking about them? This course develops skills for writing about film for academic and public audiences. We’ll screen films from various genres, explore film terminology, form, and theory, discuss their social and cultural messages, and craft reviews and analytical writing for publication.

Chameleons, Changelings & Chimeras - Adaptive Writing in Context

This course will emphasize how writing changes across the disciplines, the myriad forms of evidence, and the overall contextual, that is, shapeshifting nature of communication. We will discuss changelings as topics from folklore, history, and pop culture, but also train ourselves to recognize how writing changes from one environment to the next.

Scientific Writing

This section of ENC1143 is designed to reach a wide range of science majors and/or interests. "Scientific Writing" will help students better understand the principles of reading and writing in the sciences. Specifically, we will be building a foundation of scientific knowledge by reading studies from a variety of high impact journals in different fields to develop an appreciation for scientific writing and thought.

Difficult Conversations

We encounter difficult conversational situations every day, from family and social media to the public sphere. There is another option beyond uncivil conversation or silence: civil discourse. We will explore different paths to it through writing, discussion, community-based learning, and models ranging from student conduct scenarios to hostage scenarios.

The Feed—Attention, Algorithms, and AI

Students investigate how social media, algorithms, and AI influence what we notice, believe, buy, create, learn, ignore—and even whom we date. They examine the hidden systems behind the digital feed and the growing role of AI in commanding our attention and shaping our lives.

What's Going On?

In a world where so many people profit by throwing figurative gasoline on the flames, how can we know what is really going on? This course analyzes media representations of current events while developing the critical thinking and argumentation skills needed to evaluate claims, recognize manipulation and misinformation, and communicate persuasively about the issues shaping our world.

Literature on Trial: Cross-Examining the Stories and Songs We Love

Put your favorite stories on the witness stand! In this course, you will act as a literary litigator — interrogating the lyrics, staging choices, and complex narratives of the songs, plays, and books you love to craft powerful analytical writing.

There are several Honors General Education options to choose from each semester. Use the search bar below to look for Honors General Education sections that are available. For general education course descriptions, please see the University Catalog using the link below.

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RISE 0-Credit Courses

RISE 0-credit hour courses are free and allow you to earn Honors credit for all mentored research projects, internships, and study abroad experiences that are not already Honors-earning. 

Are you doing mentored research or completing an internship but not earning course credit? Register for a 0-hour Honors RISE course and earn credit toward your Honors requirements and graduation. Are you taking a study abroad or experiential learning course that isn’t already Honors-earning? Register for a 0-hour Honors RISE section and earn Honors credit.

• IDH 4910: Honors Research - Students completing an approved research project may earn Honors credit. The research project must be logged with Engage UNF (UNF’s experiential learning platform) as part of the student’s experiential learning record.

• IDH 4957: Honors Study Abroad - Students completing an approved study abroad course through another UNF college or program may earn Honors credit. The study abroad project must be logged with Engage UNF (UNF’s experiential learning platform) as part of the student’s experiential learning record.

• IDH 4946: Honors Internship - Students completing an approved internship may earn Honors credit. The internship must be logged with Engage UNF (UNF’s experiential learning platform) as part of the student’s experiential learning record.

RISE Upper Division Courses

The Hicks Honors College is proud to partner with UNF academic colleges to offer dozens of high-impact RISE courses across the upper-level curriculum in every college and almost every major. Each course listed under RISE Upper Division will be tagged with an "Honors" attribute, counting them as an Honors credit in every available course section. You can search for available options below, and find specific information about the course on the University Catalog.

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