The ISI Honors Program brought students along with faculty and staff to Oxford University for a weeklong intellectual retreat focusing on the works of William Shakespeare. Noted expert on Hamlet, Paul Cantor from the University of Virginia, along with Oxford University scholars, James Methven and Barbara Everett, addressed the students and faculty with skill on Shakespeare and the cultural milieu in which his plays were performed. Students from schools such as Washington and Lee, Harvard, and Yale meandered through the streets of London, Oxford, and Stratford-Upon-Avon discussing everything from the commercial character of the Elizabethan playhouse—a sign that the free market can produce good art—to the religious and philosophical puzzles posed by the Bard. While there, the students enjoyed productions of Macbeth at the Globe Theater in London and Hamlet in Stratford-Upon-Avon.

While in England, the students and faculty were in residence at Oriel College, a college made famous by its prestigious alumni—John Henry Newman and Matthew Arnold. Seminars on the staging of Shakespeare, the different conceptions of tragedy, and lectures on the specific plays to which the students were audience consumed the days. In their spare time, the students wandered about the city with faculty mentors and staff taking in the sights of Oxford's colleges, museums, bookshops, coffee shops, and pubs. The conversations began in the early morning and extended late into the night.

In student responses to the event, the program ranked "10 out of 10" for quality of content. If there was one "complaint", it was that the days were too busy with lectures and formal intellectual engagement. Everyone remarked on the value of visiting England and particularly this famed center of learning. As one student put it, "The location was simply amazing —how can you beat Oxford?"