Volume 67, Issue 3  

Lee Heads Honors Program;
Strives for Continuation of Excellence
by Zalman Abramchik

This past June, Dr. Will Lee was named director of The Jay and Jeanie Schottenstien Honors Program at Yeshiva College.  Lee, who took over as acting director from Dr. Frank Felsenstein in June 2001, has been involved with the program since its inception.

The Honors Program, which offers classes in various disciplines to any interested Yeshiva College student, was launched in 1999.  This past year, seven students graduated from the program, which requires, among other criteria for graduation, an honors thesis paper.

Lee would like to see that under his tenure as director, more and more students decide to write senior honors theses.  “We knew the number of theses was going to be much lower than the number of students who entered the program,” explained Lee.  “Dr. [Gabriel] Cwilich [co-chair of the Honors Committee] and I are spending a great deal of effort and time advising Honors Program students as soon as they walk through the door.”  Lee hopes that by personalizing the program, students will more likely be motivated to graduate from it.

Dean of Academic Advisement Dr. Nada Glick, one of five administrators on the Honors Committee, shared this sentiment.  “What is needed is the personal connection,” she said.  Glick elucidated that Lee seemed to be making a concerted effort to reach the individual students and was enhancing the program in doing so.

According to Lee, the Honors Program is not an isolated and elite program meant to benefit only a select group of students.  “We want to make sure that we benefit Yeshiva College as a whole and not just the Honors Program,” he said.  Lee further explained that because the courses offered by the program are open to all students, everyone has the opportunity to gain from the program.

Not all students agree that the Honors Program enhances their YC experience, however.  One Yeshiva College senior who has taken several honors classes asserted that they “can enhance YC, but I don’t think they necessarily do because the people who take them are often stuck up and the fact that they are in an honors program gives them more of a reason to be stuck up.  People like me can’t really enjoy the class,” he maintained.  Gripes notwithstanding, the student acknowledged that the Honors Program indeed offers stimulating classes that would otherwise be missing for more motivated YC students.

Among Lee’s primary goals for furthering the development of this young program includes increasing the graduation rate of honors students.  Since 1999, 141 students were admitted into the honors program.  Although 35 students were admitted the first year and were eligible to graduate this past May, only seven did.  “We expected only the most motivated and talented students to complete the program,” explained Lee.  “I would be happy if one third of the Honors Program students finished the program.”

Glick noted that while Felsenstein’s emphasis was on getting the program started and off the ground, Lee’s leadership ushers in a new phase of the program. The stress will now be put on program and curriculum development as well as student outreach.

“Lee was one of the architects of the Program,” YC Dean Norman Adler maintained.  “I expect no change.  Only the continuation of the search for excellence.”

Lee, who has been with the program since the beginning when it was first discussed by the administration in 1995, expounded on the success of the program: “We feel that so far we’re doing a good job of benefiting YC students in general.”

In the words of the Middle States Accreditation Report of April 2002, which singled out the Honors Program as a significant factor in the strengthening of Yeshiva, “Extraordinary success and improvement have been gained through the Honors Program.”

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