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Welcome from Cynthia Hyla Whittaker, Ph.D., Chair

As Chair of the Department of History, it gives me great pleasure to welcome you to our web site, where you can find updated information about our department's activities and expertise.

Commitment to teaching and dedication to intellectual growth are the hallmark of our department. Insisting on high standards, our mission is to stimulate students to excel. We gear our methods of instruction so that we can best improve reading, writing, and critical thinking.

The scholarship of Baruch’s history professors has earned international recognition. Five Baruch historians have won Excellence in Scholarship Awards, two have been nominated for Pulitzer Prize, and several have been awarded the most prestigious grants in the nation from the Rockefeller Foundation, the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Fulbright Commission. In recognition of their expertise, several faculty members appear regularly on the History Channel, PBS, and the A&E Television Network. The sixteen full time professors in the history department are as diverse as the curriculum. Nearly half are women, and a third are either Hispanic, African-American, or Asian.

The history department takes great pride in offering a very wide range of challenging courses to students in all three schools of Baruch College. Each semester nearly two thousand students enroll in Baruch's history courses.

From introductory survey in a wide range of areas through a number of specialized and advanced courses, the department's goal is to share with its students an appreciation of history as a key to understanding the present as well as the past. Familiarity with history both of one's own country and ethnic group and of other countries, peoples, and eras ­ is essential grounding for success in any career after college and especially for advancing to positions of leadership in business, a profession, or public affairs.

The history department is known for its curricular innovations and its participation in the Baruch College Honors Program, the Feit Seminars, and other multi-disciplinary activities, including new programs in Asian and American studies. Students who major in history benefit from personal attention to their intellectual achievement and career success. The department regularly offers a range of courses in each summer session to Baruch students as well as to undergraduates from other colleges.

I invite you to learn more about us by examining our entire site. Additional information, including a list of courses, is given in Baruch's Undergraduate Bulletin. For further information, please telephone the Department of History at (646) 312-4310.