Apr 28, 2024  
2023-2024 Undergraduate Catalog & Student Handbook 
    
2023-2024 Undergraduate Catalog & Student Handbook

Department of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences


Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences

Department Chair: Dr. Tom Dvorske, Associate Professor and Vice Provost of Academic Affairs

Degree Programs

Certificate Programs

Associate

 


Overview

The Department of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences’ supports the University’s mission to serve students and industry through teaching and research. Our work emphasizes analytic, creative, and critical thinking; problem-solving; clear communication; evidence-based argument; and more. Our rigorous multidisciplinary approaches prepare students to solve human problems in industry, science, and engineering and set the foundation for civil dialogue and an informed and engaged citizenry.  

The Department offers essential coursework where students advance their skills in communication, research, critical thinking, and open-ended, qualitative problems. Courses in writing, such as Composition or Technical Writing, facilitate students’ learning through meta-cognitive self-awareness, reflective practice, and audience identification. These skills support STEM disciplines in terms of user experience, identifying with clients and industry professionals, and documenting code and other technical specifications that impact our lives in various ways including financial, health and safety, and our overall quality of life.

The department also offers coursework in art, philosophy, humanities, history, and social sciences that contribute to a well-rounded student. These experiences are as important as lab or research opportunities in that they make students better practitioners in the professional and cultural contexts of their lives. Our courses foster creativity, divergent thinking, broad awareness of social and historical forces as they impinge upon our sense of ourselves as a society and individuals, and tools core to these disciplines that illustrate the root connection where art and science meet: observation. 

Finally, the department offers students the opportunity to take their intellectual curiosity further and earn add-on certificates in Applied Liberal Studies or Storytelling and Digital Media. These certificates round-out students’ technical programs with advanced creative and practical study and experience in soft-skills that support strong, successful careers. 

Associate of Arts, General

See Program Description  for additional details.

Certificate, Arts-Humanities-Social Sciences (AHSS)

See Program Description  for additional details.

Certificate, Storytelling and Digital Media

See Program Description  for additional details.