To honour, or not to honour? Now that is the question many students entering their third or fourth years of university are asking themselves. Is it worth the all-nighters, the stress and potentially lowering your grades in the rest of your courses? Does it eventually pay off?
One thing is for sure, honouring requires having time to research and write. Lots of it. This means less time to work. So would gaining work experience be a better option than honouring?
Arianne Melara graduated from St. Thomas University in 2015 with an honours in Political Science, and a major in Economics. She earned the prize for the best honours in Political Science of her graduating class.
According to her, an honours has many benefits to offer job seekers or recent graduates.
“It signifies to the employer that you are an individual who has ambition, passion, commitment and has experienced handling heavy workload.”
However, she thinks it depends on the field and the type of career an individual is interested in. The thesis might more readily help someone who wants to build a career in academia as opposed to someone who wants to build a career in the corporate world.
The decision of doing an honours should be one reached specifically by the student’s desire, not simply because of a professor’s suggestion. Simply put, your honours becomes your life for two years. You must be engaged and willing to commit for as long.
“The topic lives in your dinner conversations, occupies your thoughts in the shower or during the bus ride, and even becomes a recurring dream [or nightmare],” said Melara.
For her, doing an honours meant opening the door for anxiety to settle in. However, she would do it again in a heartbeat.
“You are introduced to a thousand other interesting topics and issues in the field that you might not know about. You learn how to analyze an issue critically … and it prepares you for graduate school.”
Andrew Moore, Great Books professor at St. Thomas University thinks students should seriously consider doing an honours.
“Students honouring in our program have to complete a thesis as well as take multiple seminars, so the work is challenging,” he said.
Because of this, Moore suggests students talk to their professors before deciding to take on the task.
“The honours degree is most important if you’re thinking about graduate school. I’m not sure it makes much of a difference in the world of work. I’m sure a lot of employers would be just as impressed with a Dean’s List average and a major. But if you really love the subject matter, if you can’t get enough of it, an honours is great.”
