Honors at Graduation

Undergraduate students in the College are eligible for two degree honors designations after all coursework has been completed and posted to the student's CU transcript : "Latin Honors" degree honors or "Engineering Honors Program" degree honors.  Once the degree is officially conferred, one or both of these earned honors display on the student's transcript and diploma.

Latin Honors

If a student's cumulative CU GPA (all coursework in the Undergraduate Career GPA on the CU transcript) is at least 3.700, the student will automatically receive a Latinate honor.  A GPA of 3.700-3.799 earns the "cum laude" designation, 3.800-3.899 earns "magna cum laude", and 3.900-4.000 earns "summa cum laude".

Engineering Honors Program

Students in the Engineering Honors Program who complete a specific set of requirements may be eligible to earn "with honors".

NOTE: For the purposes of graduation ceremonies, student grades through the previous semester are used to issue honors award medals as mementos (cum laude = green medal, magna cum laude = red medal, summa cum laude = purple medal, with honors = white medal).  Students are notified by email approximately 2 weeks prior to spring or fall graduation ceremonies to pick up these medals.  The medals are for ceremonial purposes only and do not mean a student truly earns the associated honors, because all final grades need to post to the student's transcript before official degree honors are known.  If a student is near the threshold of reaching a particular level of degree honors, once ALL of their final grades post to the CU transcript and the level is achieved, they can email engineeringdeansoffice@colorado.edu to arrange for subsequent pick-up of the respective medal (if desired).  Regardless of any medal for ceremonial purposes, more importantly the student's transcript and diploma will reflect the officially earned degree honor.

Departmental Honors

Applied Mathematics and Engineering Physics students may be eligible to earn College of Arts & Sciences departmental honors at graduation by writing and defending an honors thesis. These departmental honors are issued by the College of Arts & Sciences, not the College of Engineering & Applied Science.  Reach out to a departmental contact for more information.