Why Honors Matters

As part of the National Collegiate Honors Council’s (2022) collection of essays about the value of honors to its graduates (1967–2019), the author reflects on the personal and professional impacts of the honors experience. In 2022, I turned half-a-century old. I have a loving family, good friends, and a really interesting career at a large law firm. By any measure, I am a lucky man. So how, over these fifty years, did I get here? Supportive parents, who were also public-school educators, are unquestionably the foundation. A good law school education? No doubt, that also helped. But time and again, when I think about the inflection point for my personal and professional path, it was my time at the University of Delaware. To be more precise, it was the university’s Honors Program