Learn (ELP)
The Reaud Honors College is committed to providing both alumni and students with opportunities for leading edge research, scholarship and creative activity. Our Experiential Learning Program (ELP) empowers our alumni to serve in a capacity that would ultimately be mutually beneficial for both you and our students.
Stay connected to honors!
If you are interested in serving as the lead for RHC students who will assist with your research, scholarship or creative activity, please reach out to the Reaud Honors College dean by submitting the form.
"I truly enjoyed my time with the LU honors students. As a whole, I found them to be extremely thorough, creative, disciplined, enthusiastic and productive. At the end of our five-week program, we ended up with roughly 30 pieces of high-quality work. My clients (and I) were incredibly impressed."
— Dr. Lindsey Cauthen, Class of 2007
Cancer, Connection & COVID-19
The global pandemic proved that meaningful connections between alumni and students can take place both virtually and in person. Dr. Lindsey Cauthen (Class of 2007) came up with the Cancer ELP because she noticed the COVID-19 pandemic was restricting access to valuable in-person educational opportunities. During Summer 2020, she led a team of Reaud Honors students to create clear and unbiased resources for cancer patients, while also encouraging students to work on optional "Special Interest Projects." Visual aids, digital animation, and article translations were some of the heartfelt Special Interest Projects students created. Some of the students' work has been published by the Cancer Guide Research Foundation. Additionally, our Cancer ELP has branched out and is now working with several colleges across the United States, including University of California-Irvine; Rush University; Washington University; and MD Anderson UT Health Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences.
Dr. Cauthen's guidance empowered this team of Reaud Honors students to broaden both their research and presentation skills. The team presented their work at the —the first students ever to participate in the summit—and shared their Cancer ELP idea as a way of reimagining Honors education at the National Collegiate Honors Council Conference in Fall 2021.
On the research side, students developed their skill of communicating technical terms for a general audience, which was important for each of the students, as they all aspire to go into healthcare, and familiarized themselves with scientific databases. "Before going through the ELP, some of us had no idea how to search scientific databases, and now we can confidently search these databases, which is important for those of us wanting to get involved in research," wrote Arizbeth Lopez Garcia, a Biology Pre-Med student, in her Cadenza article about the Cancer ELP.