Departmental Website
Overview
The discipline and subject matter of History require and also develop skills in the following areas: research; organization; critical thinking and analysis; synthesis; reading, writing, and speaking.
Reasons to come to study History at EIU include:
- Quality. For example, EIU's History department is known as one of the top undergraduate departments on campus. It also has a strong reputation in the state and nationally.
- Our student journal, Historia, is a several-time winner of "best student journal" in a nationwide competition sponsored by Phi Alpha Theta, the national history honors society.
- Faculty. Our faculty are true scholar-teachers. All members have earned a Ph.D. and are active in their fields of research. With over 20 faculty and around250 students in all our programs, we are able to maintain small classes of 10 to 40 students at the most. This means there is plenty of opportunity for one-on-one interaction. And all of our classes are taught by the professors; we do not use graduate assistants to teach classes. We also have quality centralized advising.
- Curriculum. Our faculty includes specialists in the history of the United States, Europe, Russia, Asia, Africa and Latin America, on periods from the ancient world through contrmporasry times so you will have a wide range of classes from which to choose.
- Extra-curricular activities. We have an active History Club that sponsors field trips, book sales and film festivals, as well as Epsilon Mu, a regional chapter of Phi Alpha Theta (the national history honors society), which sponsors conferences and competitions. We also publish an annual student journal, Historia.
- Scholarships. We offer around 20 scholarships for students in History, from those for incoming freshmen and transfer students to those earmarked for advanced juniors, seniors and graduate students.
Option(s)
International Studies, Teacher Certification
Hours Required
51 for B.A. in History; 78 for B.A. in History with Social Science Teacher Certification; 54 for History with International Studies option.
Departmental Honors Program
Yes
Four Year Degree Plan
http://www.eiu.edu/history/4yearHIS.pdf
Graduate Degree Opportunities After Graduation
history, law, library and information technology
Course Catalog Listing
http://catalog.eiu.edu/preview_program.php?catoid=24&poid=3458
Typical Starting Positions
While over half of our majors go into teaching at either the secondary or college levels, nearly half pursue other professions. Here are some paths that our graduates take:
Teaching
Public history, such as museums and archives.
Government, local, state and federal, from legislative research to FBI.
Publishing, both print and web.
Business.
Documentary films .
For more discussion of the above, see "What Can I Do With a History Major?" at:
http://www.eiu.edu/history/undergrad_career_opportunities.php
Well Known Companies that Hire EIU Graduates
Secondary schools and junior colleges in the state and across the nation, American Express, Associated Press, Charleston Times-Courier, EIU, Great Books Foundation, Historic Preservation Agency, Springfield, Illinois Department of Commerce and Community Affairs, McGraw-Hill Publishers, Midwester University, Purdue University - Westville, Smithsonian Institution, Sprint, U.S.Air Force, U.S. Army, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, University of Illinois.
Notable Graduates
Jim Edgar, former governor of Illinois; Bruce Janu, teacher and award-winning documentary film-maker; Martin Ruhaak, Schulte Roth & Zabel LLP , Washington D.C.