Proposal for History Topical Emphases 1
Cover Memo
Proposal from the History Department:
Topical Emphases in History
Submitted for Review, Spring 2013 (Revised April 2013)
As directed on the UCC webpage (http://www.uwlax.edu/records/facultyservices/
Preparing_Forms_for_Curriculum_Committee_Review.htm), the Department of History has
produced this memo detailing a proposal alternate curricular paths within the existing History
Bachelor of Science degree. This should assist discussion in UCC and other venues. Please
contact Department Chair Charles Lee at clee@uwlax.edu with any further questions.
I. Executive Summary
II. Rationale
III. Summary of Involved Courses, Changes, Personnel
IV. Deliberative History within Department
V. Estimates of Student Numbers and Staffing Impact
VI. Contact information
VII. List of attached LX forms
I. Executive Summary
The Department of History at UW-L proposes alternative, additional curricular options in specific
historical topics or methods in order to
• meet student desire for preparation in history linked more closely to career options
• better prepare students for graduate school
• use existing resources in a new way
• increase the total number of students majoring in history
• incorporate demonstrations of skills sought by potential employers.
These topical emphases would augment rather than replace existing emphases defined by
geographical region and time period. As such, it builds on existing strengths, including a longstanding
public history minor and many years of hiring new faculty with broadly diverse coverage of world history
topics. This proposed revision has been under discussion in the department for at least five years, with
some courses and personnel already in place. The proposal features three emphases, in Public and
Policy History, Social and Cultural History, and Religious Studies.
II. Rationale
The UW-L Department of History has offered a Bachelor of Science degree in history with
several curricular options over the years, emphasizing three areas of expertise: courses in world
history that require broad knowledge of the globe; courses that focus on one region of the world; a
curricular path geared towards the preparation of teachers in secondary education; minors in all of
these areas, along with an additional minor in public history (generally defined as the practice of history
geared towards audiences outside the classroom, including museums, historical interpretation, oral
history, and similar endeavors).
But worsening economic conditions combined with tensions over the value of liberal arts have
created concern among students and in the profession as to the practicality of historical study. When
the linkage between undergraduate study and eventual employment is unclear, students
Proposal for History Topical Emphases 2
understandably are dubious about choosing to pursue a degree in history. This has resulted in a
declining number of students majoring in history over the last decade.
This proposal does not abandon the emphases of liberal education but is intended to provide
meaningful connections between the study of history and paths in post-graduation life that do not
necessarily require students majoring in history to teach in secondary education. By emphasizing
topical and methodological approaches to history, this proposal facilitates transition into careers outside
of academia, as well as paths to graduate school and religious study.
Additionally, these proposed emphases do not require a separate or dedicated faculty who
could not also engage in the other curricular paths of the department. While existing needs in the
general education world history survey course have required the hiring of a broad swath of faculty with
expertise in different regions and time periods, those faculty who have already been hired and who will
be hired in the future also have expertise in methods and topics with which they examine those periods
and regions. This proposal re-uses the existing specialties, methodologies and interests of faculty
already in the department because of their coverage of time and place to serve the additional topical
emphases; it also allows faculty who are hired in support of the new emphases to nevertheless share
interests and responsibilities in existing world history majors with veteran faculty. As such, it might be
useful to think of this proposal as a different way to slice an already-existing cake.
These proposed topical emphases would also serve the existing departmental mission, which
states that “We develop historical understanding and global perspective through courses in the
University’s General Education program and a balanced world history curriculum, strengthened by
faculty specialties in a wide range of time periods, cultures, geographical areas, and thematic
approaches.” The proposed emphasis would bolster attention to that last item, “thematic approaches,”
which are not currently reflected in curricular offerings. Furthermore, the proposal reinforces the
importance placed in the mission statement on developing “analytical and interpretive skills through a
curriculum focusing on material culture studies, oral history, cultural resource management, and
community studies.”
The goal of more closely connecting undergraduate study with career paths and demonstrating
skills valued by employers is a component of all three emphases. These tracks all require the creation
of a portfolio of written work based on coursework but geared towards demonstrating writing and critical
judgment skills valued by employers and graduate programs. This portfolio will be tailored for each
emphasis, but will probably include sample CVs, cover letters, examples of student work and the like.
Each emphasis also includes an internship/field experience option to put students in direct contact with
cultural institutions, museums, or non-profits appropriate for their emphasis. Individually, the social and
cultural emphasis works to place the student’s study of social and cultural institutions in historical
context, coupling it with the skill set needed for employment in non-profit and community advocacy
sectors. The idea is that a grounding in the history of how people form community ties, fight for their
rights, or represent group identity would prepare a student to take on those type of working-with-thecommunity, community-government liaison, social interest group roles in 21st century world. The
religious studies emphasis would prepare students with broad knowledge of religious forms and
institutions, to go on to graduate studies, non-profit work, or divinity schools. The public and policy
track would prepare students with a broad knowledge of many types of employment or graduate work in
history that is not directly related to history education in the classroom.
Teacher education students would not be eligible for any of these topical emphases; existing
curricular options specifically tailored for their needs already exist in the department, and these new
topics would emphasize methods, approaches, and career or graduate-education options as
alternatives to employment within primary and secondary education.
As the approach to topics and methods within history described in this proposal has overlap with
academic treatment of these same topics outside of the discipline, these emphases include
opportunities for students to count interdisciplinary work from other departments on the UW-L campus
towards their history major. Where appropriate, the UW-L history department has consulted with these
departments during the planning process.
Proposal for History Topical Emphases 3
III. Summary of Involved Courses, Changes, Personnel
This initiative requires the creation of three new 40-credit topical emphases with the history
major, and three new 20-credit topical emphasis minors. It also requires the elimination of the alreadyexisting minor in public history, which will be superseded. The three emphases, topics, or tracks, from
which students might choose include Public and Policy history, Social and Cultural History, and
Religious Studies. Specific descriptions of the emphases are included in the attached LX-138Ps, while
a full list of all attached forms is in section VII of this document.
The new topical emphases include 12 new courses and the modification of two existing courses
at this time, with LX forms for most included in this package. Many of these courses have been
proposed as part of the rotations of new faculty hired in the last seven years. Of these, one course that
was conceived as serving the new major (HIS-391) has already been approved by the UCC and was
taught Fall 2012. One course (HIS-407: State and Society) serves two emphases. Four of the 12 total
courses are courses proposed by new faculty who began employment at UWL in Fall 2012. The
rationale for hiring and job description for these faculty included contributions to this planned major. In
addition, three new hires – to begin Fall 2013 – with expertise in education and social policy will likely
contribute to one or more of the emphases.
These topical emphases exist within the longstanding framework of courses and curricular
development within the History Department. Therefore, the three topical emphases include existing
“core” history courses, including 200-level surveys of world regions, the HIS-200 introduction to the
history profession, the HIS-490 senior seminar, the existing 400-level internship or field experience
course, and a number of the existing 300-level “Category III” world or regional history classes. Other
extant courses from the department have also been included as electives where appropriate; in
particular, the Religious Studies track is based almost exclusively on already-existing classes, which
have been taught in the department for many years.
In addition, the proposed topics allow the listing of a maximum of six credits from selected
courses outside the department, including both treatment of those topics from a different disciplinary
perspective and technical “skills”-centered courses appropriate to future employment.
IV. Deliberative History within Department
This proposal has been extensively discussed within the history department. The department
curriculum committee suggested creating a “thematic” category to augment existing majors in the
September 26, 2008. At that time, this plan was a part of a proposal for a Master’s degree, which was
the work of an ad-hoc committee. After receiving negative feedback about the possibility of a Master’s
degree in spring 2009, the idea of a thematic category added to the existing regional emphases was
transformed into a proposal for stand-alone topical emphases. This proposal was discussed in the
September 16, 2009 faculty meeting, and an ad-hoc committee was organized during the fall of 2009.
The first iteration of this plan contained “Policy” and “Cultural Studies” as topics. The November 23,
2009 department meeting included discussion and a unanimous vote to approve a new “topical”
approach with four emphases. The department distributed assignments to write LX’s for the new
topical emphases at a department meeting February 4, 2010. Discussion of the proposal was part of
the description of faculty written in Fall, 2011, with the faculty subsequently hired in spring, 2012. The
description of need in public and policy history was a part of a “need” document in support of an
additional GQA position submitted, but not granted, in Fall 2012. The most recent department vote in
support of this planning process, with the three proposed topics of public and policy, social and cultural,
and religious history, was December 12, 2012. Faculty members resolved to complete LX forms by
Spring 2013, and the resulting documents were circulated to impacted departments in February and
March of 2013. The proposal was approved by the College of Liberal Studies Academic Programs
Committee on April 3, 2013. The CLS APC suggested at that time that the department of history
consult with Registrar Chris Bakkum to clarify that this proposal would not require a new program code,
and does not constitute a “new major” or program but rather is a new curricular path within the existing
Bachelor of Science degree in History at UW-L. This April revision of the cover memo reflects that
language, but the LX forms remain unchanged.
Proposal for History Topical Emphases 4
V. Estimates of Student Numbers and Staffing Impact
History faculty believe that a reasonable estimate of students lies between five and fifteen
students enrolling in the topical emphases per year, per emphasis, totaling between fifteen and fortyfive additional students majoring in history per year. That is, the addition of these tracks should, as a
measure of success, contribute an additional 15 to 45 students to the average yearly number of
students majoring in existing programs. As a small number of students minoring in public history
already exist, creating the new public and policy track will already be close to the minimum target of five
new students majoring in history per year for that track.
Some rough calculations of demand are possible. Imagining that students majoring in history
would take, at maximum, four three-credit history courses over the course of an academic year (in
order to reach the sum of their 40 credits over four or more years), then the additional 15 to 45 students
would require, at maximum, 60 to 180 seats in upper-division courses. With an upper-division course
cap currently estimated at 35, there would need to be at least two and more likely five additional upperdivision courses scheduled in order to support this demand, in a worst-case (best-case?) scenario of 45
additional majors per year.
Furthermore, each of the three tracks would, at absolute minimum, need to offer at least one
course in that track per semester, and preferably two, in order to cater to student scheduling pressure
and to successfully move students toward completion. This would require some number of additional,
or at least other upper division courses than are currently offered.
A number of mitigating factors of the plan limit the demand placed on faculty, including the
opportunity for students in all three tracks to count interdisciplinary credits from other departments, the
fact that many existing upper division courses are currently under-enrolled (which demonstrates unused
capacity to absorb additional students into upper-division courses), and the cross-listing of courses
within multiple emphases and tracks (including already-existing courses which will now count towards
the new topical emphases). Furthermore at least some of the new students majoring in the topical
tracks will not be additional history majors, but pulled from already-existing programs and the public
history minor, and thus would not represent an increased demand on faculty. (These already-existing
curricular programs will not be overly impoverished, however, as the largest source of students
majoring in history -- education students -- are not eligible to take the new “topical” emphases.) On top
of these mitigating factors, the history department has successfully hired several new faculty members
over the last eight years. This hiring, partly under GQA, has brought down faculty workload from
previous highs to currently manageable levels.
Impact on staffing would also be manageable for the reason outlined in the “Rationale” section:
existing faculty hired for their regional or temporal coverage for world history courses also are able to
contribute to the new thematic emphases. That is to say, historians generally have expertise in both a
time and place, and a method with which to study that time and place (or a thematic concern that
crosses temporal and physical boundaries). For example, a faculty member specializing in the cultural
history of early modern Europe could offer classes in methods and approaches of cultural history and in
the general history of early modern Europe (or Italy or Spain, etc.). Therefore, new and existing faculty
can serve new and extant courses.
Based upon these estimates and plans, it is believed that sufficient personnel currently are
employed in the department to teach these numbers of additional students. Beyond that, the new
topical emphases do not require any significant investment in specialized equipment or facilities, though
small grants may be required to support teaching innovation in particular instances. While it is believed
that the history department currently has sufficient personnel to support this proposal, it is still possible
that unforeseen demand or student preference might necessitate further hiring in the future to expand
this program beyond current plans.
Proposal for History Topical Emphases 5
VI. Contact information
Department Chair Charles Lee, clee@uwlax.edu
VII. List of attached LX forms
LX-138P History Major with Topical Emphasis
LX-138P History Minor with Topical Emphasis
LX-138P (Eliminating the existing Public History Minor)
New Courses
LX-138C/139 HIS-393 Material Culture
LX-138C/139 HIS-397 Social History of African Nationalist Movements
LX-138C/139 HIS-398 Social History of Colonial Africa
LX-138C/139 HIS-403 Exhibition Design and Development
LX-138C/139 HIS-401 History and Japanese Religions
LX-138C/139 HIS-404 Migration and Empire
LX-138C/139 HIS-405 Migration: Personal Accounts
LX-138C/139 HIS-406 Topics in Social History
LX-138C/139 HIS-407 State and Society
LX-138C/139 HIS-412 Global Trade and Labor, 1500-Present
LX-138C/139 HIS-413 Topics in Cultural History
Alterations to Existing Courses
LX for HIS-320, Introduction to Public and Policy History
LX for HIS-450, Internship / Field Experience