HONORS PROGRAMS
High School
Honors Program
At the University of Austin, we believe education begins with boldness, inquiry, and a deep commitment to the pursuit of truth. In this immersive pre-college honors program, high school students experience the spirit of UATX firsthand.
Through small seminars, talks, and social activities, students take on rigorous college-level work while building the habits of intellectual courage and lively community that define UATX, meeting students and faculty, and learning for themselves what an education here entails.
Boston
Saturday, May 2 -
Sunday, May 3, 2026
San Francisco Bay
Friday, May 29 -
Saturday, May 30, 2026
Austin
Saturday, June 20 -
Sunday, June 21
2026
“This experience has been once in a lifetime.”
Former High School Honors Student
Honors Programs
Admissions
Applications are evaluated based on basic eligibility and standardized test scores (SAT, ACT, CLT, PSAT, and others). Students who do not have test scores may submit an unofficial copy of their high school transcript to admissions@uaustin.org for additional consideration.
Students admitted to UATX’s full undergraduate program are automatically admitted to all High School Honors Programs. High school applicants with qualifying test scores (SAT ≥ 1460, ACT ≥ 33, or CLT ≥ 105) also receive automatic admission not only to honors but to the UATX undergraduate program.
Applications are due one week before each program begins.
Eligibility
UATX’s high school program is designed for high school sophomores, juniors, and seniors. Participants must be at least 14 years old and enrolled in high school before the start of the program to apply.
Cost
Completely free (meals included). Participants cover their own travel/lodging.
Parental Supervision
The University of Austin can neither provide housing nor assist with housing requests. The University is not responsible for supervising, chaperoning, or otherwise caring for students, and all participants are required to have adult supervision outside program hours.
Elevating Minds
Course Sampling
UATX’s high school honors program is a non-credit enrichment program. Students may not earn continuing education credits, credit hours, or a diploma for participation.
Contact admissions@uaustin.org with questions.
PHILOSOPHY AND POLITICS
Socrates was the first to bring philosophy down from the heavens and place it in cities. As his reward, Athens executed him. This seminar examines two dialogues where Plato has Socrates defend the philosophic life, the Apology of Socrates and the Crito, to uncover something of the philosophic life, recover the demands cities must place on citizens, and consider whether the two are reconcilable.
AMERICA’S FOUNDING PRINCIPLES
Read Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence, Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, and Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address. Together, these works invite us to grapple with the philosophic basis of American political life—its ideals, its contradictions, and its reckoning with slavery.
TRANSHUMANISM
Delve into the bold promises and perils of transhumanism. Explore visions of technologically enhanced humans and posthumans, and consider the moral, political, and even religious dimensions of this emerging movement.
THE TECHNOLOGY AND PHILOSOPHY OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
This course explores the nature, power, and limits of artificial intelligence—from how large language models like ChatGPT work to the ethical and philosophical questions they raise. Students will experiment with AI chatbots, learn the basics of machine learning, and consider issues of copyright, liability, and employment in an AI-driven world. It concludes with a discussion of human-level intelligence and consciousness: could an AI ever truly think?
DESTINATION MARS: SURVIVAL NOT GUARANTEED
Mars is 140 million miles away, and everything between here and there wants to kill you. Cosmic radiation? Check. Bone-melting microgravity? Yup. No oxygen, freezing temperatures, and months of isolation? Absolutely. Follow the global space race as superpowers and billionaires compete to plant the first flag on Mars and discover how scientists plan t bioengineer the ultimate space-ready human. Young DNA might need an upgrade.
BOSTON BUCKS: MONEY, MARKETS, AND INNOVATION FROM COLONIAL COIN TO CRYPTO
As the largest port in New England, Boston has long been one of America's most important financial centers. This course traces its most important innovations, from fiat paper money in 1690 and bank clearinghouses in the early 19th century to credit unions and mutual funds in the 20th. It concludes with an overview of Boston's continuing role in crypto, Fintech, and DeFi.
IS BEAUTY OBJECTIVE?
Judgements of taste about works of art often cluster, but people tend to defend their own taste passionately, even when they divert from the norm. It is as if having one’s own idea of beauty is experienced as a basic human right, and people fight for their taste almost as if fighting for their lives. Given this variety, can we say that beauty has an objective basis? In this class, we explore this question and possible answers, looking at answers emerging from human biology, the nature of God, or our social life.
WHY DOES GOVERNMENT FAIL SO OFTEN?
This course investigates the causes of policy success and failure through the lens of political philosophy, history, and economics. We will discuss historical examples of success and failure in several different policy areas, e.g., war, health/nutrition, and environment.
HOW TO BE AN ELITIST
Are all men created equal, or are some simply better than others? Do you think you're exceptional, or want to be exceptional, but you're not sure why or how? In this seminar, we will read essays by Winston Churchill and Leo Strauss about the challenges to excellence in the age of mass democracy.
WILL THE REAL BIBLE PLEASE STAND UP?
How did we get the versions of the Bible we have? Who decided which texts were in and which texts were out? This course explores ways of approaching these questions and critically examines canonical boundaries related to Jewish and Christian Scripture.
CHANCE, GAMES, AND DECISIONS
Begin to master probability and good decision-making when faced with uncertainty. Topics include counting techniques and probability theory, classic chance problems such as the Monty Hall and Birthday Problems, expected value and variance, and basic decision and game theory. Applications will be stressed through examples.
THE FUTURE OF AMERICAN FREEDOM
What are the greatest threats to freedom in America? In the 19th century, French aristocrat Alexis de Tocqueville warned of a "soft despotism" that could transform American democracy into its opposite, and in the 20th century, Soviet dissident Alexander Solzhenitsyn offered a similar, dire warning to the entire Western world in his famous address to Harvard University. The seminar will reflect critically on Tocqueville and Solzhenitsyn's warning that democratic freedom has the potential to undermine itself over time, and discuss how American democracy might respond to this danger.
