Welcome to The Templeton Honors College!

Since its founding in 1999, The Templeton Honors College has been committed to forming select students in the Christian intellectual and literary tradition. This tradition, the Christian liberal arts tradition, was begun by early Christians in North Africa and Asia Minor, developed in monasteries and universities during medieval Europe, and was carried into the modern era by educators like Anna Julia Cooper and C. S. Lewis and by institutions like The Templeton Honors College. Nestled within that tradition, our curriculum and community are built around great questions and great conversations, leading to great lives. You can see our Undergraduate Great Questions Curriculum Guide here!

If you are a student who wants to take your formation seriously and wants to be taken seriously, both intellectually and morally, then you may be the kind of student we are looking for. If you have spent your life reading, think at the end of pen, and long to find people who care about the same things you do, then you may be the kind of student we are looking for. If you have a sense that education should be more than overpriced job training for gainful employment, then you may be the kind of student we are looking for. 

If you want to ask the big questions and enter into dialogue with serious thinkers who have asked them before you, then Templeton may be the place for you: What is a good life? Why is there suffering? What is justice? What is a flourishing society? Does beauty matter? What is knowledge? How do I love my neighbor? How was the world made? Who is God? These are the kinds of questions we consider. But we don’t ask these questions in a vacuum nor simply pool our collective opinions; rather we ask these questions in a community shaped by the spiritual and intellectual practices of the historic Christian faith and characterized by contemplative leisure, vigorous study, and loving wonder. 

Templeton’s sequence of carefully designed and integrated seminars represent an alternative way for intellectually ambitious undergraduate students to meet their general education requirements at Eastern University. This means that Templeton students can also pursue any major Eastern offers, from Data Science to Philosophy, Dance to Nursing, Biochemistry to Business, Theatre to Theology, Mathematics to Pre-Law. In The Templeton Honors College, we prepare students to become wise and virtuous servants and leaders no matter what profession they pursue or where in the world God calls them. 

The practice of education, which we think of as holistic formation for human flourishing, carries through each of our three academic programs in The Templeton Honors College:

• Our high school Summer Scholars Program for rising juniors and seniors,
• Our Undergraduate General Education Program, and
• Our Master of Arts in Teaching (MAT) for classical school educators.

You can learn about The Templeton Honors College through our website, but I would encourage you to visit Templeton Hall on our beautiful campus, sit in on a class, and meet the scholars and students who make this a truly exceptional and life-changing place.

-Dean Brian A. Williams