Program
Overview
ADMISSION: Full Admission to the Agricultural History
and Rural Studies Program requires graduation from an accredited college
or university and class rank in the upper quarter of the class. Provisional
or Restricted Admission is possible for academically promising applicants.
Such a student will be required to demonstrate, during the first year
in the program, better-than-average ability in course work. Graduate
College rules state that transfer from Restricted to Full Admission
status usually requires completion of at least ten semester credit hours
of graduate-level courses with a grade point average of B (3.00) or
above.
GRADUATE RECORD EXAMINATION (GRE): All applicants
must take the general Graduate Record Examination and send those scores
to the Program Director.
TOEFL: All students whose native language is not
English must take the TOEFL examination and send that score to the
Program Director. A score of at least 600 is expected to merit consideration
for admittance to the program.
Before beginning or completing all official university applications
and procedures for graduate admission, applicants to the Agricultural
History and Rural Studies Program should contact the program director.
PROGRAM REQUIREMENTS
General Requirements: A Ph.D. in AHRS requires a minimum of seventy-two hours of graduate credit beyond the bachelor's degree and forty-two hours beyond the master's degree. Students may enter the AHRS program either with or without a Master's degree but students without a Master's degree in history will be required to earn an M.A. in history before progressing on to doctoral studies. Those with a master's degree in a field outside of history wishing to proceed directly to the doctoral program will be evaluated by the faculty of the AHRS program on a case-by-case basis. Doctoral students must complete an additional thirty hours of graduate seminars, twelve hours of research, demonstrate a reading proficiency in a world language, pass written and oral exams in major and minor fields, and complete and defend a dissertation. Attainment of a Ph.D. in AHRS requires the successful completion of all the requirements at each level of the three designated levels of status: Master's student, Doctoral student, and Doctoral candidate.
Requirements for a Master's Degree: Students who enter the AHRS program without a Master's Degree need to first meet the requirements for a Master's degree in history, which include thirty hours of graduate credit (24 credits of course work and 6 credits of research) and the writing and defense of a Master's thesis (Plan I). Students who attain a Master's degree at another institution may be admitted directly to doctoral student status with the permission of the program director.
Master's Program of Study: By the beginning of their second semester of graduate study, students will select an area of concentration in: United States, European, or Comparative history. For those students intent on progressing to doctoral status, this concentration should be considered preparation for an eventual teaching field. Twelve hours of course work (non-research) are required to complete an area of concentration. Course taken in this field should be general in nature and not particular to rural, environmental, or agricultural history. Ideally, studies in the concentration area will inform the student's major field of study as a doctoral student. Upon determining an area of concentration the master's student will select an appropriate thesis advisor from the department's tenure line faculty, and together they will select two other faculty members to form a Program of Study Committee. One member must come from outside the Department of History.
Master's Coursework: At least 30 credits of acceptable work, at least 21 of which must be in history. (All history credits included in the 30 credit minimum must be at the graduate level [400, 500, and 600].) A master's student may take up to 12 credits of 400-level history courses (except 490 and 495) for major graduate credit as part of their Program of Study. HIST 583 A is required of all master's students. No more than 6 credits of History 590, Special Topics, may be included in the minimum 30 credits submitted for the degree. A master's student must maintain a 'B' average in all work at the graduate level in order to remain in good standing. Grades lower than a 'B' will be cause for departmental review of the student's status. Master's students may take a maximum of 12 credits per semester. Those with teaching assistantships may enroll for no more than 9 credits a semester.
Proficiency with research tools: A student shall demonstrate proficiency in the use of a research tool as prescribed by the student's POS committee. This can be a world language, statistics, some other methodological social science courses, or the like. The student should fulfill this requirement by the end of the third semester of residence.
Students who seek to fulfill their research requirement in a modern European language can satisfy the requirement by
- enrolling in, and passing with a grade of B or higher while a graduate student, the equivalent of at least two semesters of an intensive foreign language course; or
- translating, with the use of a dictionary, in a reading examination set by a Department of History faculty member, enough material from a text in the language, with sufficient accuracy, to show adequate command of the language for purposes of research in it. Students desiring to fulfill the requirements in other languages will consult with their committee.
Students who seek to fulfill the research requirement in quantification can satisfy the requirement by taking the following: History 583B, Statistics 401 or its equivalent, AND completion of a research project supervised by the student's committee.
Master's Thesis: Under the direction of the student's thesis advisor the student will write a master's thesis based upon primary source materials. Students will register for 6 credits of research (HIST 699) while working on their thesis. Following the completion of the thesis, and in consultation with the thesis advisor, the student shall schedule an oral defense before the advisory committee following rules and timelines defined by the Graduate College. This will consist of a two-hour exam, and the committee will award a "no pass," "weak pass," "pass," or "pass with distinction." Students who fail the exam can retake it in the following semester, but a second failure will result in dismissal from the program. At a minimum, students must achieve a “pass” on their first attempt in order to be admitted as a doctoral student in AHRS and proceed to the Ph.D. program.
Requirements for Admission to Doctoral Candidacy: Upon completion of the Master's degree, doctoral students are required to complete an additional 42 graduate credits (18 credits of coursework, 6 credits of Directed Readings for exam preparation, and 18 research credits), demonstrate a reading proficiency in a foreign language, and pass comprehensive examinations in their major, second, and minor fields. Students will choose a major professor from the AHRS core faculty, a minor field professor, a Program of Study Committee, and establish a Program of Study by the end of their second semester in doctoral student status.
Fields of Study: In consultation with the major professor, doctoral students must choose major, second, and minor fields of study from the academic fields listed below. Two major fields will be in either U.S. or European History, or a combination of both. All AHRS students are required to take a field in Comparative Rural History. Doctoral students will also choose a minor field of study and a minor field advisor from the history faculty or the faculty of another department (as approved by the major professor). The minor field will constitute a teaching or professional preparation field and students will meet the appropriate requirements including at least six hours of graduate course work (3 credits of which may be in Directed Readings) and passing examinations. The minor field may not emphasize rural history or be a mere subset of the designated major field of study.
Major Fields: Select two
United States History to 1865
United States History since 1865
Europe to 1500
Europe since 1500
Second Field: mandatory
Comparative Rural History
Minor Fields: Select one
Any of the other major fields
Environmental History
History of Technology and Science
Latin America
East Asia
Women's History
African American History
Program of Study Committee: The Graduate College requires the establishment of a Program of Study Committee. This committee should be chosen during the student's first year of study although it may be changed later because the student's plans have changed or become more firmly fixed, The Program of Study Committee must include five members of the graduate faculty. The complete Program of Study Committee includes:
- the major professor in AHRS who should represent a special field that the student intends to offer in the admittance-to-candidacy examinations and under whose direction the Ph.D. dissertation will be written;
- two other AHRS Program faculty (Either core or participating) in the Department of History, who should represent the other fields of history offered in the preliminary examinations and who will act as consulting advisors on the dissertation;
- one faculty member who serves as the student's minor field advisor.
- one faculty member from the Department of History or outside the department.
The three AHRS members of the Program of Study Committee shall serve as examiners for the written and oral examinations in the student's major field. The minor field advisor shall serve as an examiner for the written examination in the minor field. All five members of the committee shall serve as examiners for the oral defense of the dissertation (final examination).
Course Requirements for the Program of Study: The student and the major professor will develop a separate Program of Study for doctoral studies distinct from the POS for the Master's degree with a strong emphasis in AHRS courses. The Doctoral Program of Study should be submitted by the end of the second semester in doctoral student status. On the Program of Study form, all post-bachelor's degree coursework is included and must be a minimum of seventy-two credits, at least forty-two of which should be beyond the master's degree. Doctoral students will complete 18 credit hours of seminar work (3 credits in a major field seminar and 6 credits in designated comparative courses) and 6 credit hours in Directed Readings. In consultation with the program director, a major professor may require specific courses particular to the doctoral student's POS. The final eighteen credit hours will be completed doing dissertation research once the student has reached doctoral candidacy. Coursework should be chosen carefully, in order to prepare the student for his or her chosen major, minor and comparative fields. Courses, where possible, should be drawn from graduate seminars and proseminars.
Grades: Students must make at least a "B" in all work taken for graduate credit. Course grades, however, are not the entire basis for evaluating student performance. Following the mid-term of each spring semester, the Program Director will solicit written evaluations of each student in doctoral student status from the appropriate faculty members. The Program Director and the Graduate Committee meet annually to review each student's academic, research, and teaching performance. At that time, the Program Director will make a recommendation concerning the student's continuation in the program and/or the continuation of an assistantship to the Chair of the Department of History. The Program Director will also meet with each doctoral student and advise them of this recommendation and provide them copies of the written faculty evaluations.
World Languages Proficiency: The AHRS program requires that all doctoral students demonstrate a reading proficiency in a world language before they are allowed to progress to doctoral candidacy. The circumstances for meeting this requirement should be supervised by the major professor and should be considered as part of the Program of Study. A doctoral student may use the same world language that they demonstrated proficiency of for a previous degree. Students admitted with a master's degree from another institution will be required to demonstrate that proficiency through a written exam. Students presenting an M.A. from the History Department at Iowa State will not be required to repeat previous language examinations. Language requirements must be met by the time the student becomes ABD. All language requirements may be satisfied by one of the two methods specified in the master's program requirements. The number of languages necessary to the completion of the dissertation will be determined in cooperation with the student's POS committee. In NO instance can a demonstrated competency in statistics and computer-based research be substituted for the language requirement at the doctoral student level. If such research tools are necessary for the completion of doctoral research they may be acquired by taking Statistical Methods for Research Workers (Stat 401) and Historical Methods-Statistical Evidence and Analysis (583B), or their equivalent as part of the Program of Study.
English Language Requirement: The Graduate College requires that all students must meet a Graduate College English requirement before completing twelve credit hours of graduate work at Iowa State University. Check with the Graduate College or the English Department for more details.
Preliminary Examinations (Major and Minor Fields): Doctoral students should plan to take their examinations early in their fourth semester of study at doctoral student status. Exams will consist of four, four hour exams over two weeks. Major field examinations will consist of a written and oral component. Minor field examinations will consist of a written component and, if necessary, an oral examination. Students will be graded within the following range:
- Pass with distinction
- Pass
- Pass - poor
- Fail
In the first two instances the student may proceed to Doctoral Candidacy without conditions. In the third instance, the student may be required to complete additional course or written work. A "Fail" requires retaking the examination, but no sooner than six months after the failure. In most cases the student will be required to withdraw from the program after failing examinations. In no instance may an examination be taken more than twice. In the event that five years pass between the preliminary examinations and the final oral defense of the dissertation, the student may be required to retake the preliminary examinations.
Requirements for Degree Completion
Dissertation and Final Examination: Each doctoral candidate shall write a dissertation on a topic selected by the candidate with the approval of the major professor. Candidates will register for at least 18 credit hours of dissertation research (HIST 699). The dissertation must address some aspect of rural or agricultural history, broadly defined. The candidate will be required to prepare and defend orally a formal dissertation proposal, which defines the subject area and problem to be the researched, suggests a tentative thesis, and demonstrates knowledge of the research materials for the dissertation. The dissertation shall be written under the primary direction of the major professor or co-chairs of the committee, but in consultation with the other committee members upon authorization by the major professor. The Final Examination, which is oral, is intended principally as a defense of the dissertation. The exam will be administered by the Program of Study Committee upon the completion of the dissertation by the student. Candidates must consult the Graduate College for details on university dissertation requirements, format, and time schedules.
Dismissal
Policy
Click link to read this policy.
