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Key Ideas in History at Texas A&M University. CID Presentation 17 January 2004. Background. What is done well Meaningful teaching experience Dissertation supervision Job placement What could be done better Support for off-campus research Gender balance in the student body
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Key Ideas in History at Texas A&M University CID Presentation 17 January 2004
Background • What is done well • Meaningful teaching experience • Dissertation supervision • Job placement • What could be done better • Support for off-campus research • Gender balance in the student body • Professional development
Competing Visions - I • How to train graduate students for jobs in schools unlike our own • Adopt a pragmatic professional point of view vs. • Introduce students to the intellectual traditions of historians and historiography
Competing Visions - II • How much preparation should students have in common? • Standardization (core courses; syllabus preparation; the dissertation) vs. • Preserving individualized student initiative and faculty guidance
Competitiveness • The department, most of whose students find academic jobs, seeks to improve the jobs they secure, through • Intellectually compelling dissertations • Interdisciplinary engagement • Broader teaching and course experience • Fields • Kinds of experience
Diversification • The department, disproportionately white and male, seeks to redress the imbalance by • Recruiting students from within the TAMU system • Reconceptualizing fields of strength • Developing select new fields • Hiring strategically
Internationalization • The department, dominated by historians of the U.S., seeks to broaden its scope with • Flexible course offerings • New foundation courses • New hires • New areas of focus
Other questions • How better to fund students • Reassessing preliminary exams • Fostering interdisciplinary endeavor
Final challenges • Reconciling competing visions in a way that enhances students’ diversity, competitiveness, and transnational awareness • Institutionalizing change