History Student Resources & Faculty

​​​​There is no defined order. That said, for students taking more than one history course, many students prefer to begin with a broader survey course in world or U.S. history before moving into more specific courses. You may wish to begin with either HIST101 or HIST102 (world civilizations courses), or with HIST120 or HIST121 (U.S. history courses), before moving to our regional courses. If you only intend to take one history course, pick the one that interests you and just make sure it meets the area requirements laid out in your educational plan. Counseling​ can assist with this.

No. All courses in the Department of History are lower-division courses, the same as those students would take in the first two years of college at a four-year university or college. Number do not indicate difficulty.

In any history course, students can expect the primary learning activities to include reading, analysis, critical thinking, and communication. The assignments given to allow that to happen will include exams and writing assignments, but other assignments such as debate, quizzes, homework, discussion, research, or presentations may also be assigned, depending on the faculty member's particular approach. 

Your professor is your first resource in terms of your work toward success in a course. Students should make use of office hours and email contact with their professors, who are here to help in the learning process. In addition to your professor, the department chair and division dean can point you toward resources that may be useful to you. SCC offers a myriad of support services for students​, and the Department of History encourages students to explore those. Finally, the SCC library​ is a wonderful resource and place to study - the Department of History encourages students to take advantage of its offerings as you pursue your academic success.

As part of the Humanities Pathway​, the Department of History supports academic mentorship for students in the pathway (History or Philosophy majors). Mentors assist students with academic decisions within the pathway, direct students toward strategies for success, and act as a resource for work in history or philosophy courses. If you would like to be assigned a mentor, please reach out to your professor or department chair.

Far more than most people assume. History graduates work in law, public policy, journalism, business, foreign service, intelligence and analysis, archives and museums, publishing, marketing, nonprofit leadership, urban planning. And, yes, scholarship and teaching, for those who choose that path.

The reason is simple: history trains the abilities every field needs and few programs teach systematically: evaluating evidence, detecting bias, constructing arguments, writing persuasively, and understanding how people and institutions change over time. In a workplace being reshaped by automation, these distinctly human skills are among the most durable assets a graduate can hold.

SCC offers the Associate of Arts for Transfer (AA-T) in History. Students who complete the AA-T and meet CSU admission requirements, including the minimum GPA, are guaranteed admission to the California State University system (though not necessarily to a particular campus or program) to pursue a bachelor's degree in History or a related field. Our students also transfer to the University of California system and to private colleges and universities. Consult a counselor or the Transfer Center to confirm current CSU requirements.

Yes. All courses in the department are college-credit courses, and many fulfill a range of general education and area-specific requirements for students in other programs. Consult the catalog or a counselor to see which requirements a particular course satisfies.

No. Some courses are not offered every semester, but most courses are offered at least once over a two-year cycle. If you are considering a History major and wish to know when a course might next be offered, please do not hesitate to inquire with the department chair.

They carry new numbers with unchanged content. Under California's Common Course Numbering (CCN) system, required by state law (AB 1111), the state's community colleges are adopting shared, student-facing course numbers, so that the same course carries the same number at every California community college. Renumbered courses are identified by a "C" prefix.

Accordingly, HIST 120 is now HIST C1001 (United States History to 1877) and HIST 121 is now HIST C1002 (US History since 1865). The courses themselves are unchanged, and credit earned under the former numbers remains valid. Additional courses may receive CCN numbers as the system continues to roll out; consult Counseling with any questions about how renumbered courses apply to your education plan.

No. The Canvas mobile app is useful for checking announcements, notifications, and grades, but it is not a substitute for the full course site, and students should not plan to complete an online history course from a phone. Among the reasons:

History coursework centers on sustained reading of lengthy texts and extensive, carefully cited writing, work that a phone screen and keyboard cannot reasonably support. Portions of course sites may display incompletely or behave unreliably in the app, including embedded readings and documents, discussion boards, and quiz or exam tools, and submissions made from the app can fail or arrive incorrectly formatted. Timed assessments in particular should never be attempted on a phone, where a dropped connection or app error can cost the attempt. Producing properly formatted written work also requires a full word processor, which is not practical on a mobile device.

Students taking an online history course should plan to work from a computer with a reliable internet connection. Students without access to one should contact the college about available campus computing resources.

History emphasizes reading varied texts, examining diverse sources, writing analytically, citing sources, and understanding the many forces and peoples who have shaped change over time across regions, communities, states, and cultures. Expect to read closely, discuss seriously, and write regularly.

While dual enrollment is an option at SCC, the History Department urges students to proceed with great awareness of the fact that these history courses assume completion of high school, with all the skills and experience that entails. Students should not assume that a history class at SCC will resemble a high school history class in any way. High school students may also have activities and other pursuits that affect the time available to devote to these college classes.

Dual enrollment students are encouraged to ask as many detailed questions as possible about the actual content of the classes they are considering when they meet with Counseling.

While the courses have no prerequisites, students are expected to be able, from the start of any given class, to engage in sustained reading in the English language, note-taking, critical thinking about materials, and extensive writing in the English language.

Two different numbers are involved, and it helps to keep them separate. First, class time: per the official course outline of record, a 3-unit history class carries 54 hours of in-class (contact) instruction. Spread across the 16 weeks of a semester, that is about 3½ hours of class time per week; that figure is class time only.

Second, study time: students are expected to spend double the class time on out-of-class work: 108 hours over the semester, or about 6¾ hours per week. Together, class time and study time come to 162 total student learning hours, roughly 10 hours per week. In short, the 54 hours are the instruction; the 162 hours are the total commitment once expected study time is included.

Online asynchronous classes translate the class time into time spent on the course website and doing course work, including interacting with other students on the course site, as one would in class; the study expectation on top of that is unchanged.

Condensed sections carry the same 54 class hours and 108 study hours, compressed into fewer weeks, which raises the weekly commitment considerably: about 13½ hours per week in a 12-week section (4½ in class, 9 studying), about 20 in an 8-week section (roughly 7 and 13½), 27 in a 6-week section (9 and 18), and about 40 in a 4-week section (13½ and 27). Students in a 4-week intersession class, in other words, should treat it as a full-time commitment.

Each professor determines the citation protocol for their course, but generally it is useful to know that in the historical discipline, Chicago is the norm, and APA and MLA are typically not used. Professors are the final word on this.

No. All courses in the Department of History require that students produce original, authentic work. The use of any form of artificial intelligence is prohibited in student work in courses for the Department of History. This includes translation software, Grammarly, closed-system language models, and any other programs which intervene in the analysis or writing process. Students are encouraged to set up their word processing programs in a way that disables AI-driven features.

Faculty are the sole determiners of whether AI hallmarks are present in the work submitted by students in their courses. Students should be aware that this policy may differ from those of other departments and prepare accordingly. The protocols concerning this policy are laid out in the syllabus for each individual course.

Because the work is the education. The skills our courses exist to build (reading critically, weighing evidence, and constructing your own written argument) can only be developed by doing them yourself. Work produced by a machine leaves those abilities undeveloped.

It depends on the question. The department chair, Rachel Petrocelli (Petrocelli_Rachel@sccollege.edu), can inform students about history courses and the learning they entail: course content, what a class involves, and when a course is likely to be offered.

Counseling is the only division at SCC that advises students on enrollment, education plans, degree requirements, and related matters. For those questions, make an appointment with Counseling; the Transfer Center is also a valuable resource for transfer planning.

Students can obtain syllabi from the Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences (AHSS) division office, which holds all syllabi, past and present.

Students look for the schedule in Self-Service, which lists sections, days, times, formats, and instructors. For full course descriptions, search the college catalog.

​​​Course student learning outcomes (SLOs) describe the skills, abilities, and content acquisition that result from study in a particular course. Regardless of topic, each course in the Department of History will emphasize these SLOs, which encourage success across​ students' academic lives and into their professional pursuits.

1. Critical Analysis: Students will develop analytical skills by evaluating key historical decisions, testing hypothesis, and choosing among contending viewpoints.
2. Communication Skills: Students will develop communication skills through writing exercises, exams and discussions of historical events.
3. Citizenship: Students will be equipped to act as better informed citizens and knowledgeable voters through the study of U.S. political traditions and concepts of citizenry. 
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4. Diversity and Global Citizenship: Students will demonstrate the ability to discuss, analyze, and compare and contrast, diverse world cultural, religious, and political traditions.