Honors Admission

Application Process

Beginning Fall 2021, the Letters and Science Honors Program has changed how students will be eligible to be admitted to the program. 

All potential Honors students of any class year, whether incoming first years, continuing second years, or transfer students, will need to complete an application. This application will ask you to write two short responses that consider the Program’s core values: 1) What are you most excited to learn about, and how will being in Honors help you pursue that knowledge? 2) How do you want to use your experience in Honors to contribute to the UCSB and/or broader community? Detailed prompts will be available on the application link. See below for additional application details for each class year.

Note: Admittance to the Honors Program will be made in the following manner:  All students will have a set deadline of a few weeks to turn in their application essays. However, for some cohorts, especially incoming first years, there are always many more applications than available spots. Therefore, from the applications submitted on time, we will conduct a lottery and review the essays accordingly. After several years of various admittance strategies, we find this to be the one that allows all students an equitable chance of joining the Honors Program.

Incoming First Years

In mid-May the Honors Program will email all Letters and Science students who have submitted their Statement of Intent to Register, inviting them to apply for the program. 

Continuing Second Years

Non-transfer students entering their second year at UCSB can apply to the Program beginning August 1st and will need to have a 3.2 GPA on 36 attempted letter-graded UC units. The application for Continuing Second Years (non-transfer) students will appear here in August when the application opens. We encourage you to apply soon after the application opens, as admissions are made on a rolling basis.

Transfer Students

During the summer, the Honors Program will email incoming Letters and Science transfer students who have submitted their Statement of Intent to Register, inviting them to apply for the program. Transfer students will need to have a 3.5 GPA  at their previous institutions or a 3.2 if transferring from another UC.