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Department of History
Department of History
Graduate Program Outcomes Assessment
The Graduate program of the History department assesses student outcomes, and
works with students to help them succeed within the program, in several
different ways: students at the M.A. and Ph.D. level work closely with faculty
advisors to plan their graduate course programs, to prepare for their
comprehensive examinations, and to prepare and defend theses or dissertations.
Mindful of difficulties encountered in the past, the Graduate program has
introduced several key reforms the goals of which are twofold: (1) to help
graduate students perform at a high level in course work, examinations, and
research projects; (2) to help them prepare more effectively for the academic
and non-academic job markets.
M.A. Program
How Student Outcomes/Accomplishments are Assessed
All M.A. students, whether taking the 30 credit hour non-thesis option or the
24 course credit hour plus thesis option, must earn a cumulative grade point
average of 3.3 in coursework. No grade lower than "B-" counts toward completion
of any course work requirements for the MA degree. If a student's grade point
average falls below 3.0, the student is placed on probation with one semester to
raise the grade point average to at least 3.0; failure to accomplish this will
terminate the student's participation in the program. Upon completion of
coursework, the student must pass a written comprehensive examination, set by
the student’s faculty committee (see below) and comprising 6 essay questions
based on the student’s reading list and coursework. All three members of the
student's committee must certify that they find the examination acceptable. The
chair of the committee submits the examination to the Director of Graduate
Studies, who, in consultation with the Graduate Studies Committee, reviews the
examination and approves it or returns it to the student's committee for
revision and resubmission. When two or more students are to be examined in the
same field, the Director must ensure that the several examinations are of
comparable difficulty. To pass the examination, the student must obtain a
cumulative score of at least a B- (2.666); if the student fails the written
examination, he/she may retake it once. Students who choose to write an M.A.
thesis must defend the thesis at an oral examination, with three faculty members
on the examining committee.
Preparing Students for Degree Requirements
All M.A. students, whether specializing in American, European, or World Areas
history, work with an advisor and two other faculty members who serve as the
student’s advisory committee. This committee helps the student develop a
coherent, well-structured program of study, define a reading list for
comprehensive examinations, and, for thesis students, learn how to write a
thesis based on extensive use of primary sources. After an initial meeting with
the committee in the student’s first semester on campus, the student meets
regularly with his or her advisor and with the full committee if needed. Each
spring the student and advisor meet to assess the student's progress; the
advisor then prepares a report for the student's file. If the advisor and the
student’s committee believe that there are problems with the student’s progress
to degree, the committee and/or advisor brings these problems to the student’s
attention and work with the student to develop a course of action to address the
problems. In most cases, this course of action does not entail the student’s
withdrawal from the program; in some cases, however, the student is urged to
reconsider whether graduate study is appropriate.
New Initiatives
Two initiatives have been introduced in the past five years to increase
opportunities for M.A. students in History: the Museum Studies Certificate
program, and the Dual M.A. with Religious Studies and East Asian Languages and
Civilizations. Museum Studies certificate program allows students who pursue a
combination of course work and internship opportunities to prepare for
employment in museums and historical societies. The Dual M.A. allows students to
pursue concurrent degrees in any two of the three departments currently
participating in the program. This is an especially attractive option for M.A.
students considering a career in secondary education, or for those who hope to
move on to an explicitly inter-disciplinary Ph.D.
Ph.D. Program
How Student Outcomes/Accomplishments are Assessed
All Ph.D. students must complete 45 hours of course credit before taking a
two-part comprehensive examination. They must define a major area of
concentration, and two secondary fields, one of which must be in World Areas.
They must pass a four-hour written examination in their major (or "A") field
(e.g. U.S. History since 1865) before qualifying to take a two-hour oral
examination in each of their three fields. All A fields have standard reading
lists, and the student is expected to have mastered the reading list before
taking the comprehensive examination. A student is admitted to candidacy after
having passed both the written and oral comprehensive examination. These exams
are rigorous: students who prepare extensively and work closely with their
advisory committee are likely to succeed, but they must pass each field in order
to pass the entire exam, and some students do not pass on the first attempt.
Graduate School procedures allow students who fail the comprehensive examination
on the first try to take the exam a second time. Students who pass the
comprehensive examination are ready to prepare a dissertation prospectus, which
must be approved by the student’s dissertation committee and by the department’s
Graduate Studies Committee. Once the prospectus has been approved, the student
proceeds to work on the dissertation. An oral defense of the dissertation is
required before graduation: at the defense the student is examined by a
five-person committee, one member of which must be a member of the graduate
faculty from outside the History department.
Preparing Students for Degree Requirements
At the beginning of a student's Ph.D. program, each student works with
relevant graduate faculty to establish a 3-person subcommittee for the A field. Its function is
to advise that particular student on courses to take, reading lists to work through, and
exam preparation for the A field. It is the committee's responsibility to set
the A-field exam, based on the standard A-field reading list, for that
particular student. The three-person committee is chaired by the faculty member
who in all likelihood will be the student's dissertation advisor.
To help students prepare for the A-field comprehensive examination, the
program requires that they take designated colloquia in either American or
European history. These courses introduce students to important works in the
major fields, and constitute an introduction to the A-field reading list.
New Initiatives
To develop the student’s capacity to examine historical problems within a
global context, the History Department recently introduced a World Areas
component that is required of all Ph.D. students. Each Ph.D. student must take
at least 6 hours of course work in one World Area (the department offers courses
in the histories of Japan, China, India, the Middle East, Africa, and Latin
America), and must prepare for examination in this field at the oral exam. Our
recent experience suggests that students who have completed the World Areas
component of the degree are better able to think comparatively across time and
cultures, and are better positioned to compete for teaching positions, many of
which require a teaching competency in World history in addition to research and
teaching expertise in the student’s principal field.
Indicators of Success
Our current, and recently graduated, students have been very active in
presenting their scholarship at national conferences and some have established
publication records comparable to students from the top graduate programs in the
country. Our more advanced Ph.D. students have received national fellowships and
grants, including a Fulbright Fellowship to study in Italy, two Gilder Lehrman
Research fellowship for research in New York libraries and archives, and a
Garrison Fellowship in the History of Military Medicine. Several recent
graduates have received book contracts from major university presses for revised
versions of their dissertations. In the last academic year, our recent graduates
were especially successful in securing academic positions: five of the six Ph.D.
students who were on the academic job market received tenure-track jobs or major
post-doctoral fellowships. In the last seven years, we have placed graduates in
tenure-track jobs, in public history administration, in secondary and
post-secondary teaching, and in museum positions.
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