The coronavirus pandemic brought about many challenges for students in the 2020-2021 school year. As a result of the unprecedented times faced, the UC Santa Barbara Honors Program decided to reduce their requirement of 6 honors experiences needed by graduation down to 5; however, this reduction was only enacted for students who would be graduated by Spring or Summer of 2021. 

The "honors experiences" at UCSB are courses, contracts, or other forms of challenging academic work that are to be completed by the students in the UCSB Honors Program. It is entirely understandable why students graduating in the thick of the pandemic were direly in need of this reduction. Yet other honors students faced harsh circumstances as well, and have not been granted this same courtesy. Taking rigorous, intellectual classes while navigating the frontier of virtual learning this past academic year was a daunting task to be faced by the honors students, not to mention the woes of dealing with a devastating pandemic. 

The last stance honors students have heard in relation to the completion of honors experiences is that we will still be expected to complete 6 experiences by graduation. We are asking the directors of the UCSB Honors Program to review their stance on the matter and extend this same reduction to students who joined the Honors Program amidst the COVID-19 pandemic.