About the Dean's List
The Dean's Honor List is the list of undergraduate students who have demonstrated a high level of scholarship in a given semester. They are recognized as such by the university's administration and an honors notation is added to their academic record for that semester.
Qualifications for the Dean's List
At St. Thomas, undergraduate students are placed on the Dean's List when the following qualifications are met:
- The student attains a grade point average of 3.50 or higher at the end of a semester in which they have taken at least twelve credits for regular grades (A, B, C)
- The student has received no grades of D or F or marks of I or R
- NOTE: Evening program students must have taken at least eight credits in a semester and meet the same requirements.
How and When Students are Notified
Undergraduate students who qualify for the Dean's List will receive an e-mail letter from the Associate Vice Provost for Student Achievement commending them for their academic achievement. The e-mail will be sent to the students' St. Thomas e-mail inboxes.
The full Dean's List is also made public on the Dean's List Webpage. (Please note that it can take some time for the website to be updated.)
The Dean's List cannot be run until the final grades from a semester are processed, which is usually approximately one month after final exams conclude. Therefore:
- Fall semester Dean's List students can expect to receive their notification in mid- to late-January, and
- Spring semester Dean's List students can expect to receive their notification in mid- to late-June.
Previous Semesters
Students may see which previous semesters they were on the Dean's List by accessing their Academic Transcript in Murphy Online. If a student was on the Dean's List for a certain semester, it will be listed there as an "Additional Standing."
J-Term and Summer
J-term and Summer term grades do not count toward Dean's List qualification. Only semester (Fall and Spring) classes/grades are eligible.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
If you believe you should have been on the Dean's List for a certain semester, but you were not listed and received no notification, please see below for some common explanations.
- Did you achieve at least a 3.50 GPA for the semester? If not, you will not qualify for the Dean's List.
- Did you take at least 12 credits for regular grades (A, B, C, etc.) during the semester? If not, you will not qualify for the Dean's List.
- Did you receive any grades of D or F? If so, you will not qualify for the Dean's List.
- Did you receive any marks of I or R? If so, you will not qualify for the Dean's List.
- Did you have any late grades (or did you recently complete an Incomplete grade)? If so, it's possible you have simply not been added to the Dean's List yet. Once your late/incomplete grades are processed, if you meet all other qualifications, you will be added to the list and receive a notification.
If none of the above situations apply to you, please reach out to undergradstudies@stthomas.edu for assistance.
Dean's List letters are no longer sent to the home address. If you wish to have a Dean's List letter sent home, please use your St. Thomas e-mail address to e-mail undergradstudies@stthomas.edu with "Dean's List Letter Request" in the subject line and include the following information:
- Your full name
- Your 9-digit St. Thomas ID number
- The address where you would like the letter sent
Note: please make sure your request comes from your St. Thomas e-mail address and not a separate personal e-mail address.
No; due to privacy laws (FERPA), the student must be the one to request a Dean's List letter. Students may contact Undergraduate Studies to request that a copy of their letter be sent to a family member (or other designated person).
St. Thomas does not notify media outlets regarding the Dean's List. Students wishing to inform local newspapers, etc. about their status should reach out to those media outlets directly.
At St. Thomas, the academic functions of the university are organized into units called "colleges" (e.g., the College of Arts and Sciences) and "schools" (e.g., the School of Engineering). Each school or college has a dean (for instance, the Dean of the College of Business), and all those deans report to the Office of Academic Affairs, which is charged with coordinating the activities of the various schools and colleges that are part of the university's undergraduate program.
At one point in the university's history, students who qualified for the Dean's List were notified of their accomplishment directly by the dean of the school or college for the student's major field program. However, some students have more than one field of study, and all students take courses in the College of Arts and Sciences (in addition to major field courses that might be in a different college or school within the university).
Therefore, a single office was charged with taking responsibility for acknowledging students who qualify for the Dean's List each semester, and since the Office of Academic Affairs is the common authority over all the university's colleges and schools, it was agreed that the Associate Vice Provost for Student Achievement would be made responsible for sending the notifications.
No, the Dean's List only includes undergraduate students. Graduate students who are interested in learning about academic honors that may apply to them should contact their graduate department directly.