Housed in the Sociocultural Studies Department, History supports student success, completion and transfer. We strive to cultivate in students historical reasoning skills that facilitate life-long learning and that will help them to become contributing members of a diverse society.
History is the study of how the society we live in came to be. Through contemplation and analysis of historical materials, historians interpret the past and contribute to collective memory. The Associate Degree for Transfer in History supplies students with foundational knowledge in United States and World History, as well as with an introduction to the historical inquiry process. The degree offers two of four courses required in the CSU, Chico major core program, in addition to courses approved as electives in the general history option. With successful completion of the History program, the student will be able to: 1. Identify major developments in the history of the United States and of the world, and to examine the past from diverse perspectives. 2. Apply historical reasoning to the study of the past and to think in terms of causation, context, chronology, and change and continuity. 3. Utilize historical method through posing questions and conducting research, analyzing evidence, and articulating defensible conclusions The courses that comprise the AA-T degree are also for Butte and transfer General Education. With over eighty sections offered each school year, History serves a significant number of students and meets an array of important General Education and transfer requirements. History course offerings are complimented by 2 courses listed under the Humanities discipline title. Currently, there are 3 full-time faculty in History who together teach 45% of History classes. 55% of courses offered in History are taught by associate faculty. This is an improvement over last year, when 82% of History courses were taught by associate faculty. The improved ratio is due to a new full-time hire, Dillon Carroll, in Fall 2019 and the return of Christie Trolinger to a full teaching load after a few years of substantial reassign time.
No SLOs have been reported since Fall 2016.
FTES in History has been increasing during the past year. While there was a downturn in 2018 (Camp Fire, power outages), History's drop FTES was not a serious as for the college as a whole.
Retentioon rates have remained relatively stable even with the downturn of the college and FTES. Sucess rates remain relatively low and need to be improved. Further infromation must be collected to determine why sucess rates remain below 75 percent.
History does not have a certificate program and degrees awarded remains relatively flat. Further marketing may provide an opportunity for increasing the number of degrees awarded.
History completed its most recent Program Review in May 2010, in conjunction with the Humanities and Philosophy disciplines. Of the Validation Team's ten Recommendations, eight are applicable to History/Humanities. Below is an abbreviated version of the Recommendations, with comments.
- Continue and expand offerings of theme-based history classes. *** History's experiment with theme-based classes was short-lived; the effort was abandoned after one semester. This was not due to lack of interest, though, on the part of students and instructors. Rather, there were logistical obstacles within our current systems (scheduling, classroom space, associate faculty seniority). There is hope that the Guided Pathways model under consideration by Butte College might introduce new avenues (and relevance) for theme-based history classes.
- Two new full-time history instructors to replace retirement and resignations. *** We hired one full-time faculty member, Dillon Carroll, in Fall 2019.
- Evaluate the placement and viability of courses in the Humanities discipline. *** All but two courses in the Humanities discipline have been deleted. The two that remain provide content in the history of Western Civilizations -- areas no longer offered in History (due to changes at the CSU) but desired by some students seeking transfer to a UC. An idea under consideration is to revise/replace HUM 17 and HUM 22 with C-ID aligned Western Civilizations courses. Also being discussed is an Introduction to Humanities course.
- Cross-list HIST 18 with MCS and reapply for HIST 18 to meet the U. S. History requirement for CSU and IGETC. *** Cross-listing of courses is now discouraged by the College's Curriculum Committee. In Fall 2017, HIST 18 was submitted to the CSU to meet the U. S. History requirement and approval has since been received.
- Complete SLO assessments and Curriculum Review in the Humanities discipline. *** The Humanities curriculum is current. While assessments are conducted regularly in Humanities courses, there has not been follow through in terms of reporting of "deep dives" in CurricUNET.
- Continue to work on assessment of PLOs. *** History did not have true PLOs back in 2010, as we didn't have a program (degree). Since then, we have implemented the AA-T in History with specific PLOs. Our PLOs are aligned with course SLOs, and PLO assessment has occur through assessments at the course level. In 2018-2019, we re-conceptualized our deep dive assessment schedule to make it more sustainable and to be more centered on PLOs.
- Work with Administration to ensure adequate and appropriate work space for part-time faculty. *** At the time, associate faculty had just lost access to dedicated work space in the LRC building. Since then, offices in the MC and LRC have been designated as associate faculty offices.
- Consider providing stipends for part-time faculty to help with department work. *** History had a much larger budget at the time of this Recommendation. It is no longer feasible with our existing budget. And besides, an institution-wide policy/fund for stipending associate faculty would be more appropriate and fair.
- Course Success Rate Study
- Curriculum Updates
Strategy 1 - Course Success Rate Study
During Fall 2020, program faculty will review and analyze student success rates, including distance education and equity-focused data. From the findings, next steps, strategies, and a timeline will be developed.
Course success rates in HIST for FA 2015 - FA 2018: 61.83, 67.08, 63.88 and 73.23%. The significant increase for FA 2018 is likely explained by the changes to course content, assignments, and expectations made by most faculty in the aftermath of the Camp Wildfire. Ignoring the FA 2018 data, course success rates remain notably lower than the overall college standard of 70%, as well as the course success rate of 74% (2018-2019) for all Transfer/GE courses.
Strategy 2 - Curriculum Updates