College of Liberal Arts

Dean: Edward Kohn

The College of Liberal Arts is composed of the School of Criminology and Criminal Justice; the Department of English and Communications; the Department of Modern Languages; the Department of History and Political Science; and the Department of Psychology and Education. In addition, the college is the administrative home of courses in philosophy and music.

Mission

The mission of the College of Liberal Arts is to provide a comprehensive education that prepares students to think critically and creatively, to value and pursue inquiry, to gain knowledge, and to express themselves effectively in oral, written, and visual forms. 

Through its Humanities programs the College seeks to bring students to a sophisticated understanding of the stories, histories, and ideologies that inform our collective and personal identities and perspectives, and of the languages that mediate them.  Through its Social Sciences programs the College encourages students to engage and illuminate the complexities of social, cultural, and political interactions, past and present, and to seek empirical answers to the ambiguities of human cognition and behavior. Uniting both, the College asks students to develop cross-disciplinary understandings that recognize scholarly disciplines as they reflect a world of diversity and change.  Through intellectual and professional application, students of the College of Liberal Arts are expected to examine and shape their own conceptions of themselves and their roles within communities beyond Norwich University, and develop the skills of thought and expression critical to any career.

Accreditation

For a complete listing, refer to the Accreditation section of this catalog.

Co-Curricular Activities

Through its academic programs, the College of Liberal Arts sponsors publishing, broadcasting, and performance activities open to all students of the university. These include the student newspaper, The Norwich Guidon; the student-produced video news magazine, Our American Journey; the campus literary magazine, Chameleon; the student radio station, WNUB-FM; the campus theatrical troupe, The Pegasus Players; and such musical organizations as the Regimental Band, the Grenadiers (a rhythm and blues group), and the Campus Choraleers. These activities are described more fully in the General Information section of the university’s catalog, under the headings Musical Activities, Publications, Radio Station, and Television Program.  The college also houses two centers: the Peace and War Center, which offers opportunities for research, internships, and work with scholars and practitioners in the fields of war and peace, and the Center for Writing, which offers free one-to-one consulting, as well as small group workshops, to the Norwich community, using peer consultants, sophomores, juniors, and seniors from a wide range of disciplines who are trained to work with writers on a variety of writing projects—academic, creative, professional, digital—at all stages of the writing process.

Director:  W. Travis Morris; Associate Director: Elizabeth Gurian

Faculty: Professors William Clements, Penny Shtull, Aimee Vieira; Associate Professors Elizabeth Gurian, Min Li, W. Travis Morris; Assistant Professors Matthew Fischer, Connie Hassett-Walker, Stephanie Maass, Robert VandenBerg; Lecturers Corey Brown, Steven Hrotic. David Sem (Internship Coordinator)

Mission: The School of Criminology and Criminal Justice provides its students with a liberal arts education, and prepares them to excel in the fields of criminal justice and applied sociology.  This education emphasizes criminology, criminal law, social justice, and the criminal justice system.  It cultivates a local and global commitment to the principles of justice, ethics, and public service.

Majors and Minors Offered:
The School of Criminology and Criminal Justice offers a Bachelor of Arts degree with a major in:

The School of Criminology and Criminal Justice offers minors in:

A supportive minor offered by the School of Cybersecurity, Data Science, and Computing:


Program Certification:
The Criminal Justice program is certified by the Massachusetts Department of Higher Education for the Police Career Incentive Pay Program (PCIPP), established through the Quinn Bill.

Chair:  Lea Williams

English Mission:
The Norwich English program invites students to become strong writers, readers, and speakers; to explore and analyze language, genre, and form; to understand the structure and history of the English language; and to develop an awareness of individual, ethnic, gender, geographic, and cultural diversity through the study of literature, creative and rhetorical writing, and criticism. Our curriculum engages a range of texts across geographical boundaries, cultures, and traditions and encourages creative and critical thinking. We are committed to opportunities that cultivate freedom of expression, personal and professional fulfillment, intellectual development, collaboration, and social growth. Our course offerings include rhetoric and composition; British, American, and World Literatures; creative writing; public speaking; film; theater; and other media. We also offer minors in English and in writing.

The English program also supports:

  • Pegasus Players, one of the oldest campus theatre troupes in the country, founded in 1927
  • Sigma Tau Delta, the international English language, literature, and writing honor society
  • Norwich University Writers Series, which brings creative writers to campus for readings and classroom visits
  • Chameleon Literary Journal, Norwich’s student literary and arts magazine in publication since 1961. PoemCampus, a month-long celebration that includes poet visits and student readings on campus
  • The  Peace and War Center Writers Series, which invites creative writers who explore the experiences of conflict and peace to campus.


Communications Mission:
To enhance students' writing skills in analytical, practical, and creative writing in the areas of journalism, broadcast writing, advertising, and radio production. To increase students' knowledge of the structure, history, and practices of the field of mass media, as well as provide them with the skills necessary to enter the current employment market in the field. To increase students' awareness and appreciation of the aesthetic aspects of television production, radio production, and journalism. To enhance students' exploration of individual, gender, ethnic, and cultural diversity through the study of contemporary media.

The Department also supports the following:

  • The Norwich Guidon, the bi-monthly official student newspaper of Norwich University, has earned thirty national awards since it was first published in 1922.
  • WNUB-FM, the student radio station, has been in operation since 1967 when the University was granted a non-commercial educational FCC license.
  • Our American Journey, the student-produced documentary series, has won more than 100 regional and national awards since 1989. This includes 12 national first place awards and the 1999 College Emmy award in for “Best Documentary.”
     

Majors & Minors Offered:
The Department of English and Communications offers a Bachelor of Science degree with a major in:

The Department of English and Communications offers a Bachelor of Arts degree with a major in:

 The Department of English and Communications offers minors in:

Both the English major and the Communications major demand that students write and speak clearly and precisely about historical and contemporary ideas. They provide excellent preparation for many professions and occupations, including law, medicine, teaching, communications, business, government, and military service, as well as excellent preparation for post-graduate study in a variety of fields.  In addition to these two majors, the department offers strong minors in English, Writing, Communications, and Philosophy, as well as course work in Music.

Chair: Steven Sodergren

Mission:
The Department of History and Political Science provides students with the tools necessary to function as responsible and productive members of their communities. Our graduates work with others and appreciate and respect different opinions and beliefs while also thinking independently and critically.  The Department encourages the growth of self-discipline, intellectual ability, critical thinking, and the ability to express ideas with clarity and precision.  Recognizing the importance of experiential learning, the Department of History and Political Science encourages its students to explore opportunities to learn outside the classroom.

Majors Offered:

​​Minors Offered:

Each of these Bachelor of Arts degrees prepares students for a life and career after college by emphasizing skills related to critical thinking, effective written and oral communication, synthesizing and drawing conclusions from disparate data, and information literacy.

Special academic opportunities include working with faculty one-on-one on research projects during the summer, in independent studies during the academic year, and in a two-semester senior Honors program. The faculty in the department also encourage off-campus study, whether in the Washington, D.C. area or in another country.

Honors in History and Political Science
Students with a grade point average of 3.0 or higher, and who meet all university and departmental curricular requirements, and have grades averaging 3.2 or higher in courses in their major will be, at the end of their junior year, eligible to become candidates for the history or political science major with honors. Students who have not met these standards may be invited to candidacy by the department. Six credits will be assigned, normally three hours each semester. A successful defense of an honors paper must be conducted and a minimum grade of 3.5 must be earned for the student’s registration in an Honors Course to appear on the transcript. For further guidance, see the History and Political Science Department’s Honors Thesis Guidelines.

Pre-Law Training Faculty Advisor:  Jason Jagemann
The Association of American Law Schools identifies the following as the major objectives to be sought in an undergraduate pre-law curriculum:

  1. comprehension and expression in words;
  2. critical understanding of the human institutions and values with which the law deals;
  3. creative power in thinking.


These goals can best be approached with a curriculum where social sciences and English play the leading part. One of the leading American law schools advises college students preparing to study law: “The importance of history in a pre-legal program cannot be over emphasized”; and of political science: “This subject also is one with which the lawyer must be well-acquainted and it, too, is a natural college major for pre-law students.” Accounting (for which mathematics is a prerequisite) is also strongly recommended by law schools.

Chair:  David Ward

Mission:
The Department of Modern Languages identifies as its mission foreign language education for the purposes of fostering an understanding and awareness of the international composition of the global community and of preparing students to serve effectively as US and world citizens and as leaders within that community. Thus conceived our departmental mission supports the University’s vision, specifically its declaration that “Norwich University will be a learning community, American in character yet global in perspective; engaged in personal and intellectual transformation, and dedicated to knowledge, mutual respect, creativity, and service.”

The department offers a variety of courses, conducted primarily in the language of instruction, in the following languages:

  • American Sign Language
  • Chinese
  • French
  • German
  • Spanish
     

The faculty seek to impart, as well as produce, knowledge of these languages and the cultures, cultural texts, and literature created in these languages, as well as those of US Latinos. We strive to pursue our mission by providing the highest quality instruction, supporting study abroad, bringing to the University and local community cultural events that foster appreciation for diverse and rich modes of cultural expression, and pursuing original scholarship by our students and faculty.  In recognition of the unique brand of Norwich as the nation’s oldest private military college, we support the initiative of the national armed forces to prepare its future officers with competence in foreign languages, two of which—Chinese and French—are recognized by the Department of Defense as category A immediate investment strategic languages.

New students who have completed more than one year of instruction in a foreign language are required to take the Foreign Language Placement Test before they are enrolled in their first Norwich course in that language.

Credit earned in the Department of Modern Languages is sequential. Students may not obtain credit for language courses taken at a level lower than that for which they have already demonstrated proficiency. Students may choose to audit a lower-level course but may not receive credit for it.  Students who have earned or transferred in Modern Language credits cannot subsequently earn or transfer in Modern Language credits for courses below the level previously earned or transferred.

Majors Offered:


Minors Offered:

Chair:  Kevin Fleming

Mission for Psychology:
The Psychology Program provides the student with a broad-based foundation in the discipline. Psychology is a scientific enterprise that attempts to articulate principles of human and animal behavior. These principles are formulated within the context of biological, socio-cultural, and environmental factors. Psychology is both a field of scientific inquiry and a professional activity: it shares its subject matter and its methods with the biological and social sciences, while simultaneously sharing some of the same concerns of the arts; namely, human motivation, emotion, aesthetic appreciation and experience, creativity, and the individual’s relations to the world and humankind. Students pursuing a BA in Psychology at Norwich may explore the discipline from the experimental, personality/social, the developmental, and/or clinical perspectives. Upper-level practica, internships, or field placements that permit the student practical work experience in a special interest area are encouraged.

Mission for Education:
The Education majors provide essential course content and preparation in knowledge and performance standards set forth by the State of Vermont Agency of Education in their Core 2 Teaching Standards. The Education program is in line with the Interstate New Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium standards from which Vermont’s Core Teaching Standards were adapted. Education programming also fulfills the endorsement standards outlined by the Vermont Agency of Education for each area of Education-related licensure that is offered at NU. Norwich University hopes to contribute to the important field of education by producing well-prepared, dynamic educators who will have a positive impact on their students.

Majors Offered:
Bachelor of Arts degree with majors in:


Bachelor of Science degree with a major in:

Minors Offered:

Accreditation/Licensure:
The Education Teacher Licensure program--available in secondary (Mathematics) and elementary tracks--are accepted for teaching licenses in Vermont and several other New England and Middle Atlantic states where the State of Vermont has interstate licensure agreements.