The sky’s the limit: Take Flight Scholars Program expands at Lone Star College System

HOUSTON, TX -- The Honors College at Lone Star College System offers high-achieving students access to enriching courses and programs, including the Take Flight Scholars Program—a partnership with Rice University designed to help members explore career options based on their interests, participate in rigorous research opportunities, and prepare to transfer to four-year institutions.

The program launched in 2022 and initially catered to science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) students at LSCS and San Jacinto College. This year, it’s expanding to serve students studying arts and humanities, business, and social sciences.

“Take Flight is designed to help our students be successful no matter where they’re transferring, to make them better student scholars and to support their goals,” said Katharine Caruso, Ph.D., LSCS associate vice chancellor, Honors and International Education. “We are thrilled to expand this amazing program to even more of our talented students.”

Participating students can attend thought-provoking lectures, conferences, workshops, documentary screenings and fine arts performances hosted by Rice University, as well as Take Flight-specific programming like information sessions on securing undergraduate research experiences, the transfer application process, and pursuing a path to medical school. Fall semester “Take Flight On Campus Days” allow Take Flight students to tour Rice, attend a class and connect with students while on campus.

They can also apply for paid summer research opportunities, from part-time introductory lab work to working full-time with a research team. These competitive experiences offer mentorship and help students develop their skills in real-world scenarios. New this year, Rice is developing discipline-specific experiential and career-focused summer workshops that are tailored to business, social sciences research and the humanities.

At the fall Take Flight kickoff event, some 150 first-year students learned about the opportunities available to them, discussed their goals for the year and received advice from program alumni.

“All the experiences I had at Lone Star really gave me an edge. When I got into Rice, my resume was stacked from all the opportunities I had,” said Noor Ayache, LSC-Tomball graduate and philosophy major at Rice University. “If you can, try to work toward presenting your research at conferences, studying abroad and participating in extracurriculars. You should take advantage of all the opportunities you can here at Lone Star.”

Learn more about The Honors College at LoneStar.edu/College-Departments/Honors.