Major Assessment Plan

Department Mission Statement

The Department of History and Geography believes that the study of the past is a broad humanistic discipline that is essential to self-discovery and social betterment. As such it serves directly the mission of St. Ambrose University as a Liberal Arts institution. To understand our personal and collective paths through time is the groundwork to understanding the present and the possible future we create. Thus the study of history is a political and social act of utmost importance, and it must entail a bold confrontation of the challenges of the present and of our future possibilities.

The Department fosters the development of cognitive skills, written and oral expression, and critical thinking in all of its courses. The development of students' writing skills is central to the Department's mission; examinations at all levels require written essays, and a variety of paper assignments provide students with opportunities to practice their writing craft.

The Department helps prepare students to be global citizens. Courses in World Civilization and the histories of Europe, the Middle East, East Asia, Latin America, and Africa provide a solid grounding for students who want to pursue the international programs now being offered at St. Ambrose.

2) Learning Objectives for Majors

To introduce students to basic concepts through the study of the classical period, the Middle Ages, Early Modern era, and the contemporary world.

To offer students opportunities for advanced study in world civilization, American history, and the history of Christianity.

To develop the communication skills of students in all history courses through assigned essays, papers, examinations, and class presentations.

4. To train history majors in the methods of historical research.

To stimulate student interest in the human condition and encourage students to serve their communities.

Relationship Between Curriculum and Mission/Objectives

3) Methods for Assessment in Major

Portfolio: Once a student declares a history major, the student's advisor will begin to build a portfolio of the student's work, including assignments and papers from both introductory and advanced coursework. The portfolio will be reviewed by the department on an annual basis to determine the extent of the student's progress, and the student's advisor will relate the department's findings to the student. Contents of the portfolio will include:

a. All transcripts of the students coursework (SAU and transfer institutions).

b. A representative writing sample from a survey course (HIST 101, 102, 111, 112), if available.

c. Written comments from the instructor for each course the student completes in the department.

d. The student's major paper from WI-HIST 400.

e. A paper in the student's major area of concentration (chosen by the student in consultation with the student's advisor).

f. The student's updated c.v.

Surveys: The department will conduct two surveys. The first will be an alumni survey to assess the strengths and weaknesses of the department's major in the workplace and graduate school. The second will be a survey of graduating majors to assess how well students fell the department has prepared them to achieve their life goals and objectives.

GRE: The department will encourage those students planning to attend graduate school to take the GRE history exam. As this exam is not universally recognized as a particularly good method of assessing knowledge in the field, the department will collect date generated from this test, but will not require students to take it.

Documentation of Student Learning in Major

Student portfolios will be kept in the student's advising file until the completion of his/her course of study. (Students will receive a copy of their file upon graduation). After graduation, the portfolios will be kept in the department library (located in Ambrose 222).

Use of Assessment to Improve Education

Information gathered through assessment will be reviewed in the year before the department's program review. Department faculty members hope to use this information to pinpoint the strengths and weaknesses of the history major at St. Ambrose and implement necessary changes to the department curriculum. Of particular interest will be the success of the department's graduates in gaining entrance into history graduate school programs and their performance in the job market.

Plan to Evaluate the Department Assessment Plan

After the department has had enough time to collect and evaluate the data generated from this plan, it will review the assessment plan and make appropriate changes.

Results of Assessment in the Major

Present and describe any data which assesses student learning

Please find copies of our alumni assessment survey and a compilation of our assessment data in Appendix A (Survey) and Appendix B (Data).

We chose to divide our alumni assessment survey into to parts - one that applied to all alumni regardless of graduation date, and another part that focused on curricular assessment for graduates over the past ten years.

Evaluate the major program in terms of requirement, sequencing.

We are comfortable with the present requirements in the History and History Education majors. The surveys provide the necessary foundation that students need to succeed in the upper-level courses required for the majors, where they need to go beyond the mere facts to deal with competing interpretations of history in a sophisticated fashion. We integrate the development of analytical and writing skills into our 200- and 300-level offerings, offering students a variety of ways to learn how to evaluate an author's thesis, determine the meaning of primary source documents, and express personal interpretations of the past in written and verbal formats. Our capstone experience in HIST 400 allows students to use most of these skills taught in department courses and complete a significant paper of original historical research.

Since many of our students in the majors are also seeking certification as secondary school teachers, we are to a certain degree forced to follow the dictates of the Iowa and Illinois education departments when putting major requirements together. If we had to add something, it would most likely be a 200-level course focusing on fundamental research methodologies in the discipline. After evaluating our assessment data, we feel comfortable with the way we are introducing students to the basic skills of the historian at the present time.

In our last program review we re-numbered several courses and established a rationale to distinguish 100-, 200-, 300-, and 400-level HIST courses. 100-level courses were true "surveys" of US history and world civilization. While students are introduced to excerpts of primary source materials and asked to provide interpretations of these materials in class discussion and course journals, the bulk of the students' work at the 100-level involves learning the fundamental data of US and world history from secondary sources. 200-level courses require students to do more reading from secondary sources and more sophisticated writing assignments that incorporate primary source materials. We chose to offer our regional surveys of Asian, African and Latin American history at the 200-levels, as well as our courses in American Catholicism and Iowa history. History and History-Education majors may take 200-level courses as "advanced" classes in the History major. 300-level courses have been designed to make students aware that "history" may be written in a variety of ways, and students learn to differentiate between competing interpretations among historians. After they have the opportunity to analyze secondary sources, students in 300-level courses learn how to integrate primary source materials into their written work. In this way, students prepare themselves for the HIST 400 paper in which they need to develop a personal interpretation of the past based on in-depth analysis of primary and secondary source materials.

After reviewing our assessment data, we feel very confident that we are providing our students with a positive experience in our classrooms. Alumni graduating over the past decade provided us with what amounted to a ringing endorsement of our efforts to help them develop the necessary communication and research skills required for success in their careers. In addition to these skills, we feel we helped promote a sense of community in our classrooms; these alumni have certainly provided us with evidence that they left SAU with fond memories of their time in our courses. We have noted their suggestions for improvement, and we feel that we have already taken measures to incorporate these suggestions in our department offerings.

Liberal Arts Assessment

In essence, all history courses (regardless of course numbering schemes or content) promote the same type of skill development activities. Contrary to popular belief, history is not a game of Trivial Pursuit. Accumulating a foundation of factual information is important to an appreciation of history. The opportunities, though, to develop critical things and written/oral expression skills, not to mention the chance to gain an appreciation of the diverse opinions in our society and in the world, are what make this discipline so valuable a part of every student's general education experience.

The department, therefore, offers the following statement on history general education that applies to all of our general education courses:

Students are introduced to a body of facts about the past. ("Know") This introduction is essentially interdisciplinary, as the story of history often touches upon the stories of philosophy, religion, the humanities, and the sciences (in addition to the social sciences: political science, economics, sociology, psychology, and anthropology). The general education courses in history attempt to survey a number of important themes of a particular time period and/or geographical region. This survey is an opportunity to identify various patterns of behavior, value systems, social institutions, and epistemological structure to give the student a factual foundation from which to build further analytical and expressive skills. ("Think About")

In the course of learning "the facts," students are introduced to the practice of "doing history.,, The raw materials of history--official documents, contemporary writings, material culture, and oral interviews, to name a few--are made available to students, and they are given the chance to derive their own interpretations based upon these materials.. While gaining an appreciation of the historian's craft ("Know"), students involve themselves in the rudiments of historical research and interpretation. ("Do")

After analyzing both primary and secondary sources and developing a personal interpretation of the past, students must then put their thoughts into words ("Do"). It is important that all students learn how to express their historical interpretations on paper and in spoken form, particularly because these skills can be applied to any discipline and/or occupational field in the student's future. (just as every well-written academic essay should have a thesis, a body, and a conclusion, a sales representative for a company should have a well-organized presentation with substantiating data to pitch to potential customers.) Before writing the final draft of a paper or presentation, students are encouraged to work with each other to exchange viewpoints and refine their personal opinions about the topic under study. (Sometimes the assignment will be collaborative in nature, with a group of students having a problem assigned to them for research and interpretation.) In the end, the student learns that the study of history depends greatly upon human interaction and the exchange of different ideas. ("Think About") It is hardly a solitary process; good history depends upon open discussion and debate.

The more students immerse themselves in the study of history, the more they should realize that there is a vast diversity in our world. What might appear an obvious point to one may not be obvious to people in other societies and cultures. One of the most valuable lessons a student can learn in a history course is to respect differences of opinion and to seek to understand the basis for another person's argument. Of course, it is through this process that one learns to scrutinize one's own opinion and come to grips with one's own culture's system of values. ("Think About")

Key for general education assessment grid:

audio-visual materials

book reviews

comprehensive exam

computer-assisted learning

document analysis

essay exams

essay/objective exams

formal writing

group discussion

group presentation

group projects

individual conferences

individual presentation

informal writing

journal

lectures

map quiz

outside speakers

panel presentation

position papers

readings

reflective essays

research papers

source based paper

study abroad/field trip/off-campus

unannounced quizzes