Fall 2020 FAQ for students interested in History

Before reading this, we encourage you to thoroughly read and comprehend the Swarthmore College FAQ.

Q: Are there courses that you recommend taking as a first-year student?
- A: Absolutely. We highly recommend our First-Year Seminars (#001) for first-year students. These are more intimate classes that are taught more like a seminar than a lecture course. The professor will coach you through academic reading, writing, and interlocution on a specialized topic that you often won’t find in our other course offerings. In addition, we also have survey courses (#002-010) that will introduce you to a broad area of history—and history as a discipline—and allow you entry to upper-level (#011-090) history courses later in your Swarthmore career.
- You can see a slideshow of our courses we're recommending for first-year students on our homepage.

Q: Due to the current situation, I would like to take courses closer to home and take a leave from Swarthmore and then have those courses transfer in. Will the History Department accept those courses?
- A: The Department still has no plans to accept transfer credits from non-OCS programs. It is also important to note that were this to change, we would still require any external credit to be granted on a 1:1 exchange. In other words, you would only receive credit for any course taken elsewhere once you successfully completed a history course here at Swarthmore. You can read all about our External Credit Policy on our website. In addition, the College has decided that you can receive Swarthmore credit for only up to two credits taken elsewhere while on leave.

Q: How will you be teaching your courses?
- A: All of our courses, except for History 1x, will be taught entirely remotely. The largest course will have a cap of 25. Most courses will cap at 15.

Q: Will there be changes to the course schedule?
- A: In addition to the changes implemented in order for students who are on-campus to maintain a safe distance from each other when traveling between classrooms, we have also asked for ALL of our once-per-week courses to be divided into two-time-per-week courses. This does include honors seminars. It is a request we have made to the Registrar’s Office after observing and reading about “Zoom fatigue” among students at Swarthmore and elsewhere. These changes have been implemented, and we are not anticipating additional changes.

Q (from a senior major): I’d like to take a leave in the fall and return to campus in the spring. This means I won’t be taking 91. How can I fulfill this requirement?
- A: We are considering how to accommodate students who wish to do this as COVID-19 has affected you and your families in different ways. Please reach out to us as soon as you finalize your plans so we can address the issue, as every student does need to complete a culminating project. Please understand that it puts a strain on our resources as a department and as professors, and we may need to cancel scheduled courses in the spring in order to accommodate similar requests. Of course, you have the option to return in fall 2021 to take History 91 and finish your requirements. That is, you could graduate one semester later than anticipated.

Q (from a major): The department canceled a course that I was using to fulfill a department requirement. I cannot find room in my schedule for the other courses offered that fill that same requirement. What should I do?
- A: We are committed to accommodating seniors who need requirements to graduate. Courses in both Group A and Group B will be offered in each semester, and we are looking at our courses during J-Term. Non-seniors have additional semesters to make up these requirements, but if you did lose a class that fulfilled a requirement, we will give you priority for enrollment in another course in our department that fills the same requirement provided you meet the prerequisites.