A. Program Description. The Department of History at the University of Iowa offers graduate programs for candidates who seek the Master of Arts degree (MA) and the Doctor of Philosophy degree (PhD). In close consultation with faculty, students design individual programs based on varied and interdisciplinary methods of critical inquiry and interpretation. The graduate program in History prepares graduate students for many careers, including university teaching and scholarly research, historical writing and editing, secondary school teaching, government and non-profit service, and archival, museum, and library work.

B. Special Programs. The University Library has a strong history collection covering all periods and geographic areas, and including some unusual and unique documentary collections, such as the Iowa Women's Archives. The library is a Regional Federal Depository for US government documents and also holds extensive deposits from international organizations. It has wide-ranging historical newspaper and periodical holdings in print, microform and digital formats and provides access to a growing number of online collections of primary source materials. Examples include resources like Brill’s U.S. Intelligence on the Middle East and Europe post-1945, Black Thought and Culture, Times of India, Jerusalem Post, Eighteenth-Century Collections Online (ECCO), Siku Quanshu, and the Gerritsen Collection: Women's History Online, 1543-1945, five decades of papers and work donated by television news correspondent Tom Brokaw, among many others. The Library's membership in the Center for Research Libraries provides access to a wide range of additional research materials. Important collections outside the university but within the immediate vicinity include the State Historical Society of Iowa and the Herbert Hoover Presidential Library.

Graduate students benefit from the History Department's close ties to interdisciplinary departments, centers, and programs, including Gender, Women's and Sexuality Studies and the Center for the Book (both of which offer graduate certificates), American Studies, the College of Law, International Programs, the Center for Human Rights, Global Health Studies, African Studies, African American Studies, Native American and Indigenous Studies, Asian and Pacific Studies, Latin American Studies, Medieval Studies, and South Asian Studies. Opportunities for publicly-engaged research and teaching include the Graduate Engagement Corps (GEC) and HASTAC (Humanities, Arts, Science and Technology Advanced Collaboration), both housed at the Obermann Center for Advanced Study.

The graduate program in History promotes excellence in teaching via orientation for new teaching assistants, workshops for continuing teaching assistants, graduate-level coursework in pedagogy, and close supervision in the classroom. Teaching assistants begin by teaching sections in large lecture courses and move on to develop their own courses as they gain experience. The University's Office of Teaching, Learning & Technology offers additional resources for teaching, and the Office of Graduate Teaching Excellence offers a certificate in college-level teaching.

To prepare our graduates for the competitive job market, the Graduate History Society organizes workshops for graduate students on such topics as writing job application letters, fellowship proposals, and resumes. Students participate in mock interviews and give mock job talks. Graduate students gain insights into academic life through their close integration into the life of the department in the form of graduate student representation in departmental meetings and on faculty search committees.

C. Financial Aid. The Department typically offers five years of assistantship for students admitted to the PhD program. however, each year renewal will be based on performance as a graduate assistant, satisfactory progress toward the degree, and availability of funding. The majority of students receive aid in the form of graduate teaching assistant or research assistant appointments with employment terms and conditions governed by the Graduate Student Employment Standards, the University Policy Manual, the Graduate College Manual of Rules and Regulations, applicable departmental policies, and, regarding base wages, the applicable collective bargaining agreement between the Board of Regents, State of Iowa and UE local 896/COGS. The Department nominates outstanding incoming students to the University and Graduate College for recruitment fellowships that include summer support and a stipend supplement. History graduate students also receive a variety of awards and fellowships from the History Department, the University, the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, the Graduate College, and such programs as International Programs and the Obermann Center to support travel, research, and dissertation writing. Additional opportunities for employment and pre-professional training come in the form of teaching assistantships in cognate departments such as Gender, Women's, and Sexuality Studies; internships in the Iowa Women's Archives; and graduate assistantships in the Labor Center, the Stanley Museum, and other programs.

D. Degree Requirements. The PhD degree requires 72 credits of graduate course work (including up to 30 credits transferred from a MA degree), written and oral comprehensive examinations in three fields of history, and completion of a doctoral dissertation under the direction of a member of the department.