2010-2011 Self-Study Takes A

Department of History ACADEMIC PROGRAM REVIEW SELF-STUDY REPORT JANUARY 2011 Table of Contents List of Tables iv Vision and Goals 1 Introduction 2 A Brief History and Current State of the Department 4 History of the Department before 2002 4 History of the Department since 2002 6 Current State of the Department 10 Faculty 14 Activities and Achievements 14 Internationalization and Greater Diversity of Course Offerings 15 Strengths and Challenges 16 Undergraduate Program 18 Focus of the Undergraduate Academic Program 18 Assessment to Measure Success 19 Writing Enhancement for Undergraduates 20 Undergraduate Degree Program Review 21 Undergraduate Courses Primarily for Non-Majors 21 Academic Advising 22 Teaching 23 Curricular Innovation 23 Undergraduate Research 24 Student Population 26 i Diversity Recruitment 27 New Students 27 Retention and Graduate Rates 28 Study Abroad 28 Internships 28 Student Organizations 28 Scholarships 29 Capstone Courses 29 Graduate Program 30 Responses to the Program Review and CID and Recent Reforms 30 Current Structure of the Graduate Program 34 Recent Trends 41 Strengths of the Program 42 Challenges of the Program 44 Future Directions 46 ii Self- Study Appendices (On CD) A. Faculty Brief Vitae B. Faculty Prominence since 2002 C. Budget Information D. Departmental Bylaws E. Promotion and Tenure Guidelines F. Assessment Plans G. Undergraduate Courses H. Graduate Courses I. Carnegie Initiative on the Doctorate J. Documents regarding completed PhDs K. Graduate Student Handbook iii List of Tables Page 1. Faculty Arrivals & Departures Since 2002 8 2. Degrees Awarded in History 13 3. Enrollment in Undergraduate Research and Writing Courses 20 4. Undergraduate Class Sizes 22 5. Undergraduate Research 25 6. Student Population 26 7. Undergraduate Admissions 27 iv Vision and Goals Faculty in the Department of History at Texas A&M University believe that a common and compelling interest in the human past makes history an essential component of a liberal education. We are committed to teaching, research, and service by producing new historical knowledge and imparting it to students and our community. To that end, we will enhance the undergraduate experience by fostering intellectually challenging and innovative practices in teaching. Students exposed to the rigorous study of history will develop skills in critical thinking, writing, oral presentation, and the evaluation and critical use of evidence that make them more competitive in a changing job market and more sensitive to the questions facing individuals and societies in our interconnected, dynamic, and complex world. We will also foster graduate education and research in keeping with the university’s mission of global leadership by continuing to recruit and retain a highly-qualified and diverse pool of graduate students. We will support their development as teachers, researchers, and engaged scholars, thus preparing them for careers in academia, government service, and private sector employment. As a department, we remain committed to promoting a diverse faculty that excels in the areas of teaching, research, and service. At the same time, we will further develop areas of excellence within our department. 1 Introduction The Department of History last completed a self-study in January 2003, followed by the visit of an external review team later that spring. That self-study thus ran through 2002, and like earlier versions, it only focused on the graduate program. This 2010-2011 self-study takes a more global view of our department, as called for by the new guidelines for external evaluation, and focuses primarily on what has transpired since academic year 2002-2003. Those eight years saw rapid growth and dramatic change, punctuated at the end by a sharp economic downturn. We have grown from 43 to 51 tenured and tenure track faculty, which together with resignations and retirements has meant considerable turnover so that more than a third of our current faculty have joined us since 2002. This change allowed us to expand dramatically in non-U.S. fields of research and undergraduate teaching. Like much of the profession we have a much more transnational, international, and cross-border focus than eight years ago. We also have become much more demographically diverse and younger, and we have sharpened our focus on graduate education. We have a greater international presence, and a fine record of winning external grants and fellowships. We now face the challenge of holding on to what we have built and continuing to advance as a department in difficult times. A committee comprised of Sara Alpern (chair), Cynthia Bouton, Glenn Chambers, Joseph G. Dawson, David Hudson, Adam Seipp, and Phillip Smith collected evidence for the self-study. Where possible the committee sought to use data comparable to other universities and to collect the accomplishments and achievements of our faculty and graduate students since 2002. RJQ Adams, Julia Blackwelder, Terry Anderson, and Brian Linn helped the committee assemble data in some areas and worked on the wording of the first draft of the self-study. Mary Johnson and Rita Walker gave invaluable staff support. The committee submitted a rough draft 2 of this report, together with the raw evidence, to the entire faculty for comment in early December 2010. Walter Buenger collected feedback and Mary Johnson entered corrections to the list of achievements and accomplishments. Buenger edited the document with the help of Julia Blackwelder and Harold Livesay, senior colleagues with ample experience at other universities and as department administrators. It was then sent to the Department of History Executive Committee for final review and Buenger incorporated their suggestions. Preparing this document not only provided a convenient summary of our recent history and current status, it also served as a starting point for the department to reflect on its future. The document provides a brief history and current overview of the department, a candid appraisal of the faculty, and reviews of the undergraduate and graduate programs. It closes with some thoughts on future directions at a time when the department is in the process of selecting a new department head and developing a strategic plan. More detailed information appears in appendices. Our objectives in writing this self-study included offering the external review team a useful introduction to our department, providing Texas A&M University administrators a snapshot of where we stand currently, and encouraging our faculty to think contemplatively about the future. We look forward to ongoing interactions with all concerned about the best path forward. 3 A Brief History and Current State of the Department of History For a hundred years after the founding in 1876 of what became Texas A&M University, History remained primarily a service department with a faculty largely removed from the trends and norms of the broader profession. This began to change in the 1970s as the department hired a number of research-oriented faculty. By the 1980s the graduate program had begun to grow, furthering the creation of a modern department with a dynamic faculty that participated actively in the profession, an undergraduate program geared to majors, and a viable graduate program. Yet as late as 2002, the department and its faculty remained heavily focused on the teaching of U.S. history, and dominated by white males. Since 2002, a greater focus on transnational, international, and cross-border approaches to the past, and aggressive attempts to add diversity have transformed the department intellectually and demographically. We still teach a large number of non-majors in undergraduate U.S. history surveys, but we also have a growing number of majors taking a broad range of courses and a graduate program poised to take advantage of an increased number of talented and highly motivated faculty. Although by any reasonable standards a department that only recently entered onto the stage of departments striving for national and international recognition, we face the future with optimism. History of the Department before 2002 The evolution of Texas A&M University itself has followed a trajectory from which the course of the Department of History has subtended. From its original mission of training young Texans in the areas of agriculture and engineering, with other disciplines taught in support of that role, the University has emerged as a Research I institution with major research support from alumni, the state and federal governments, and corporations, and with Sea Grant (1971) and Space Grant (1989) status added to its original Land Grant designation. The student body, until 4 1963 all male and all required to serve in the Corps of Cadets, in 2011 numbers almost 50,000 with an undergraduate student body from all fifty states (though still largely from Texas) and a graduate student body drawn literally from around the world. As an academic subject, History began its life at A&M when the school first opened its doors, included along with rhetoric, logic, mental and moral philosophy, economy and “higher English” in a “Department of Mental and Moral Philosophy and Belles-Lettres,” with all courses taught by the first President, Thomas S. Gathright, surely a man of great versatility, whatever his other gifts. From that modest beginning, History in 1880 passed into a separate Department of English and History, itself a one-man band conducted by Professor James Reid Cole. A series of changes ensued in the following years, but these embodied structure more than substance: in 1888 History became one of the eleven academic departments of the College; in 1900 it became part of a new Department of History and Government; in 1924 History and Government along with other non-agriculture and engineering college divisions were classified as “service departments” and remained such until well after World War II, a classification reinforced by the decision of the State Legislature in the early 1950s to require six credit hours in American history of all students of public institutions of higher education in the state.

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