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

History, BA, MA, PhD

Periodic reviews of transcripts enable the undergraduate services coordinator to assess student progress. Students' work produced in the "gateway course" or through the senior seminars or senior thesis is used to assess the effectiveness of the program as well as the student's ability to master the research and communication skills. Exit interview data is used to assess the undergraduate program and provides the basis for ongoing discussion by faculty concerning the curriculum.

After evaluating student presentations in the senior seminars in the Spring 2000 and Fall 2000 semesters, faculty felt that some students were not completely prepared with the research and writing skills that are necessary for this type of project. As a result, the undergraduate committee proposed that the gateway course, The Historian's Craft, be a requirement for all history majors. The proposal was passed by department faculty and has been forwarded to the course and curriculum committee. This course will introduce students to research methods earlier in their academic career. Next year, the undergraduate coordinator will gather information from the work of students in the gateway course. This work will be placed in student portfolios to be evaluated when the student takes the senior seminar to show growth. A faculty committee will evaluate this comparison of work. The undergraduate committee will also discuss the option of having external readers (from outside the department) read students' papers from these classes. Also, the faculty committee will review a random sample of exams and papers from upper level courses and the senior seminars to monitor progress.

After an initial review of the graduate program, faculty determined that standards are too low and inconsistently applied. To achieve the goal of having one of the premier graduate programs in the country, faculty have raised admissions standards. The persons admitted to the program for the fall of 2002 have on average higher GRE scores than those admitted in the fall of 2001.

Faculty have also formed a committee to review and revise the objectives of the program for the upcoming year. While the stated objectives of the departmental assessment plan were met for this year, faculty feel that they need to be more specific on what they would like to achieve as well as what students will learn, and thus a full review of the program will be undertaken in the next year.