Honors Courses:

OCC's Honors Program is designed to provide an enriched collegiate experience for highly motivated students. A major objective is to prepare students for transfer; however, the goals of the Honors Program transcend this objective. The program celebrates the collaborative effort of students and instructors in reciprocal teaching-learning environments that promote student initiative, knowledge, curiosity about the world of ideas, and concern for current social issues.  Students who complete requirements of the Honors Program qualify for guaranteed priority consideration for transfer admission to a variety offour-year institutions.

The Department of World Languages offers the following honors courses:

Spanish 180H
Spanish 185H
Spanish 280H

The primary goal of the honors courses is to provide the highly motivated student with a broader intellectual experience than is offered in the basic curriculum. Activities may include field trips to sites of historic Hispanic interest, viewing and discussing Hispanic cultural videos, oral presentation relating to Hispanic cultures, etc. (5 units) 

Students may enroll in honors sections as part of their Honors Program curriculum, but may also enroll without applying to the Honors Program.  Click here to learn more about OCC's Honors Program.

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Study Abroad:  

For a number of years, Coast Community College District ran a successful Study Abroad office through which numerous students were able to participate in the invaluable experience of pursuing studies in a different country.  Unfortunately, in the wake of budgetary cuts, the program was dismantled.  Recognizing the fundamental importance of being able to offer such a rewarding experience to students, however, many individual instructors have chosen to continue to offer study abroad programs to interested students, in spite of the additional efforts and responsibilities this has entailed.  Among these instructors are a number of World Languages faculty.

Through Study Abroad, students have the unique opportunity to expand their educational experience in a meamingful cultural exchange while earning transferable college credit.  World Languages faculty have offered programs in countries such as Costa Rica, France, Italy and Spain.

Click here to learn more about current Study Abroad Programs.

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Credit for Previous Study of Spanish Pilot Program:  

Credit for previous study of Spanish is an alternative method of earning language units. If you have previous knowledge of Spanish, you may take a qualifying test, which will allow you the possibility of earning not only the units for the Spanish language course in which you enroll, but also for the previous level in the 180-185-280-285 series, at no additional charge for the previous level units.

Example: A student who successfully completed two years of Spanish in high school takes the online qualifying test; it recommends that the student enroll in Spanish 185. The Spanish Advisor agrees, and the student enrolls in Spanish 185. If the student completes Spanish 185 with a satisfactory grade, Orange Coast College will award her/him units for both Spanish 180 (5 units) and 185 (5 units) after all terms of the contract are met. The student is not charged for the additional 5 units. On the student's transcript, the grade for 185 shows up as the earned grade, the grade for 180 shows up as "P” for passing and the course as “Credit by Exam”.

Students who have no previous experience with Spanish should enroll in a 180 level class. Students who have received credit for a specific course at another college are ineligible to receive the extra units for the equivalent course at OCC and may enroll in a Spanish course for which they meet the prerequisite. Only students who have completed 12 units of regular coursework in residence at Orange Coast College with a cumulative grade point average of 2.4 are eligible to apply.

To find out more about the program, click here to download the Student Petition/Information Sheet. Please note that the deadline for the Student Petition is the second week of Fall and Spring semesters and the first week during Summer session.

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