History Learning Goals

Students who major in history can expect to achieve the following learning goals:

Develop historical perspective, that is, to gain insight on how modern conditions relate to and can be better understood with deeper knowledge of the past
Identify arguments in secondary sources and evaluate their effectiveness
Formulate good research questions
Identify secondary sources that address those questions and evaluate their quality
Grasp the concept of historiography and articulate historiographical issues, patterns, and trends on chosen subjects
Find appropriate primary sources and evaluate their strengths and weaknesses
Interpret primary sources accurately
Articulate a clear thesis statement
Build an argument principally on evidence obtained through working with primary sources
Organize a large paper and sustain the argument throughout
Communicate effectively in formal writing
Communicate effectively in oral presentations
Consistently cite information appropriately using Chicago/Turabian style footnotes and bibliography