Happy New Year and welcome to the beginning of the Spring semester!

What an exciting time this is!  With the inauguration of our first African American president, we are poised to begin a new era in our nation’s history.  But with this change also comes many challenges—an economy in flux, complex relationships with the world at large, and the task of reorienting of our priorities here at home.  Indeed, we have much to look forward to, but also much to prepare ourselves for.

There are many changes happening here at Loyola Marymount University. In light of LMU’s visit with WASC last year and the release of data from the National Survey on Student Engagement (NSSE), the University has embarked on campaign to rethink the meaning and practice of academic rigor in the curriculum.  This involves a university-wide reassessment of the content of courses, the means used to assess student learning outcomes, and a consideration of how we might make many of our courses more intellectually challenging.  While the idea of making classes more challenging may seem a bit daunting to students and faculty alike, it is driven by a recognized need to more thoroughly prepare our students to be critical, socially conscious thinkers and lifelong active learners in a rapidly changing environment.

What does this mean for African American Studies?  When I wrote to you at the start of the Fall semester, I promised you that as I began my tenure as Chair of African American Studies, the department would begin making bold moves toward its future in the form of new courses, new faculty members, and a new overall direction for the department.  These changes are already underway. With regards to courses, the core and affiliated faculty in AFAM are currently engaged in revising the learning objectives and creating a curriculum map, which will provide both current and prospective AFAM majors and minors with a clear idea of what to expect from the lower and upper division classes that make up the B.A. curriculum.  This map also provides the faculty with an idea of how we might revise existing courses or create new ones that speak to students'  interests and to the changing face of the discipline. 

Additions to the faculty are also imminent.  This semester we will have candidates for the associate level faculty position in African American Studies visiting our community to present their research, demonstrate their teaching skills, and share with us their ideas about the future of the department and the discipline. Additionally, we are in the process of creating affiliation procedures for faculty members in other departments who regularly teach in AFAM studies or who are interested in doing so.  This will broaden the range of courses offered through AFAM and allow students to better plan their schedules.

As you can see, there are many changes in store for us here in African American Studies.  For this reason, I have a special message for our AFAM majors and minors. Through it all, keep in mind that ultimately the success of our program will be judged by YOUR success as our students.   In addition to gaining greater clarity about the aims, objectives, and benefits of the AFAM curriculum in the coming months, you can expect to find yourselves challenged in AFAM courses in new and different ways. We remain committed to teaching you to appreciate the complexity and richness of the African American experience in the United States and beyond, and will do so in ways that emphasize universal themes—such as how populations experience broader social processes of group formation, community building, cultural production, and identity construction. You will also have the opportunity to develop your abilities in critical thinking and effective communication, both in oral and written forms-- skills that will serve you long after you leave LMU and pursue your chosen endeavors.

I would also urge you to take the opportunity to meet with the interviewing candidates in order to learn about the current state of research being done in African American Studies by scholars of varied disciplinary backgrounds.  I also encourage you to actively participate in classes, to visit faculty during office hours, and to learn all that you can while a student here at LMU.  In this way, we can work together toward building a department of which we can all be proud.

Contigo,

Joseph O. Jewell, Ph.D.

Associate Professor and Chair