Goals for Students' Scholarly Development

To achieve its mission, the history department commits itself to enabling students:

Course Material:

To acquire an active, substantive, and substantial knowledge of the key features and critical issues in the historical development of society
To acquire a familiarity with illustrative documents, literature, and other sources and develop an individual and independent ability to analyze those elements from an historical perspective
To develop an ability to synthesize information into broader patterns of interpretation
To develop skills of discernment and analysis in order to apply them to daily life in today's world

Communication Skills:

To employ active listening techniques, including summarizing and paraphrasing, and techniques of questioning
To express effectively one's analytical ability by writing well-organized, well-directed essays or reports
To present one's views and analytical reasoning with one's peers and interact effectively in discussion of issues

Higher Level (Critical) Thinking Skills:

To employ skeptical, evaluative, and logical approaches in processing information and forming conclusions
To create new images, concepts, possibilities, and/or interpretations and connect apparently disparate ideas
To analyze one's own thought processes, including how one's experiences, feelings, ideas, and intuition affect thinking

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