University of South Carolina Columbia
Act 629 - Summary Reports on Institutional Effectiveness
Fiscal Year 2001 - 2002

Anthropology, BA, MA.

In the past two years the introductory course in cultural anthropology (Anth. 102) has been taught successfully as a combination of lecture and discussion sections run by graduate assistantships. The archeology and biocultural faculty identified the need to develop a similar structure for large sections of Anth. 101. The goal is to add more "hands on" work with data on human evolution and prehistory, and to expand time for discussion in smaller formats.

The faculty is generally happy with the quality of training provided to our MA students, and with their success in the program and profession. MA students are active in attending and presenting papers at regional and national meetings. Students have won awards at Graduate Student Day competition, regularly received graduate school travel awards, and this past year one MA student received a Fulbright Fellowship to carry out research in Africa. However, the faculty identified several problem areas that can be addressed in student training and mentoring.

The graduate director has completed the administration of an exit interview. Students mentioned several areas where they thought their education and their experience could be improved. They want skill building (specific hands on experiences), including training in specific methods, analytical techniques, and IT skills and capacity. They would like more experience with grant and proposal writing, building a resume, and other aspects of professional development. They find the facilities and graduate stipends inadequate, and would like to see more opportunities to attend regional and national meetings. These students (and many over the years) would like the opportunity to study toward a PhD in the Department.

The Department of Anthropology is developing measures to address the needs specified in the assessment results. The department is committed to teaching a Research Design and Methods Class (Anth. 519) for students in our curriculum. The course will cover a range of methods and analytical techniques in social and cultural Anthropology. One of the features of the class is that it provides the context for completing a research proposal that can form the basis of a thesis project proposal. The proposal will replace a sit-down comprehensive exam for cultural students.

The Graduate program has restructured comprehensive exams to come at the end of the first year of study. Archeologists (and some Biocultural students) will continue to take a sit-down exam, although this has been streamlined into a three-part exam. Cultural (and some Biocultural) students will write an extensive research proposal in lieu of the sit-down exam. The instructor of record will evaluate the proposal for Anth. 519, the students' advisor and other designated faculty.

Over the past year the department has regularized a number of workshops provided to students. These include a "grant" workshop (including how to identify sources of external funding as well as proposal writing), a resume/vita development workshop, a workshop on preparing a literature review, and other specific "on demand" workshops on the use of specific methods or analytical techniques (e.g., Atlas TI text analysis software).

Over the past year faculty have been able to help out a little more on getting students to regional and national meetings. There is a minimal budget of $100 per student for travel. This amount is increased to $150 for students delivering papers, and $250 for students attending national meetings. Faculty have also been successful in helping students secure Graduate Student Travel Awards. Graduate stipends are embarrassingly small ($3000 for one-quarter time students assistantships and $4000 for one-half time assistantships per academic year). However, faculty have worked hard to place between one-third and one-half of our students in better paying assistantships across campus. These current departmental stipends represent an increase over previous years.