Lewis Honors College

Plan Your Visit High School Seniors: Apply by December 1

By the Numbers

100% Experiential Education Participation

97.2% First-Year Retention Rate

93.4% Employment or Graduate/Professional School

Mission in Action

Explore Your Purpose

Honors advisors and the Center for Personal Development counselors partner with students in their exploration of purpose to cultivate well-being, leadership, and career readiness.

Savannah King with her Honors Thesis Showcase poster

Honors at Kentucky has a long and proud history, dating back to 1959, and thousands of students have passed through our program, exploring themselves and the boundaries of thought with outstanding faculty.

Singletary Scholar speaking at the Leadership Conference

Lead With Integrity

Providing leadership development opportunities enables students to fulfill their experiential credit while bolstering lifelong skills to apply as a graduate student or employee.

The Honors classes I took my freshman year exposed me to ideas that I would not have otherwise thought deeply about. The topics we discussed have allowed me to engage with current events and the social sciences more than I would have been able to otherwise.

Asa O'Neal '25

NSF Graduate Research Fellow, Barry M. Goldwater Scholar, Astronaut Scholar

Honors students wearing Honors medallions at the Honors Medal Ceremony

Why Honors?

Honors Residential Experience

Tamika Tompoulidis with student during EXPO

Center for Personal Development

Internship, Research, Education Abroad, Service-Learning Opportunities

Dr. Ryan Voogt with Honors students in HON 310

Dedicated Honors Faculty

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Explore Admission Criteria
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News and Events

Making every opportunity count: Keanu Kawata’s UK Invests story

By Lindsey Piercy

Sep 11, 2026

Throughout the fall semester, UKNow will spotlight University of Kentucky students who are putting UK Invests lessons into practice and building the knowledge and habits they need for a successful financial future. This story features Keanu Kawata, a sophomore from Louisville majoring in accounting and finance in the Gatton College of Business and Economics and the Lewis Honors College.

TEK announces 2026-27 Faculty Fellows cohort

By Jennifer Osterhage

Sep 4, 2026

LEXINGTON, Ky. (Sept. 4, 2026) — The University of Kentucky Office of Transdisciplinary Educational approaches to advance Kentucky (TEK) has announced the TEK Faculty Fellows for the 2026-27 academic year, which includes Adrian Magendzo, Ruth Jones Lewis Faculty Scholar in Entrepreneurship. A critical mission of TEK is the development of new transdisciplinary courses and the reimagining of existing courses to emphasize one or more essential career skills.

VR practice for public speaking: Brandi Frisby’s CURATE research

By Christian Honce

Sep 2, 2026

Brandi Frisby, Ph.D., associate provost for academic affairs and former acting dean of the University of Kentucky College of Communication and Information (CI) in the School of Information Science at the University of Kentucky, and her team (including Honors faculty member Joe Martin, Ph.D.) examined how 360-degree video and virtual reality (VR) headsets can evolve public speaking pedagogy to better serve students and prepare them for the workforce.

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Honors After Hours: Let's Be Blunt About Cannabis

Sep 15, 6:00 pm - Sep 15, 7:00 pm

Lewis Scholars Lounge

420 Hilltop Ave, Lexington, KY

CPD Career and Grad School Prep Expo

Sep 16, 4:00 pm - Sep 16, 6:00 pm

Lewis Scholars Lounge

420 Hilltop Ave, Lexington, KY

The Keeping Space: A film screening

Sep 22, 6:00 pm - Sep 22, 7:00 pm

Worsham Cinema

160 Ave of Champions, Lexington, KY 40508

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