<div>The African Studies Minor has been designed to provide an intellectually coherent program of study based upon regularly offered courses in the fields of African history and culture, as well as anthropology.</div>

<div>The East Asian Studies Program offers a B.A. and a B.A. Honors, a Minor with Language, and a Minor without Language. The B.A. and the B.A. with Honors in East Asian Studies prepare undergraduate students as East Asian Studies specialists. They provide students with training in the history, political institutions, culture, and the language of a particular East Asian country (e.g., China or Japan) in a general East Asian context.</div>

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<div>The Center for Political Communication consolidates faculty expertise in emerging communication technologies, to explore their effects on elections and policy debates, to establish graduate and undergraduate research opportunities, and to encourage public engagement.<br /></div> <div>The center promotes research in politics, policy, and new technologies in political communication both in the United States and internationally. It supports events designed to engage students, scholars, media and the public.<br /></div> <div>In 2008, a revolution in political communication unleashed new ways to foster citizen engagement through social networking technologies such as Facebook, blogs, text messaging and non-traditional media. The result was a new style of political communication that is spreading globally. Studying these changes requires multi-dimensional scholarship, which is at the heart of the Center for Political Communication, drawing from Political Science, Communication, Sociology, Anthropology, History and Psychology, among other disciplines.<br /></div> <div>Political communication is an emerging field of study, with politicians and the electorate increasingly turning to new digital technologies.<br /></div> <div>The University of Delaware is in a unique position to host the center, having been dubbed the &quot;epicenter&quot; of the 2008 presidential campaign because of the work of former UD students Joseph Biden, David Plouffe and Steven Schmidt. Biden is the Vice President of the United States; he was a U.S. Senator from Delaware for more than three decades. Plouffe was manager of President Barack Obama's 2008 campaign and Schmidt was a senior campaign strategist in 2008 for Republican presidential candidate John McCain. In 2010, another University of Delaware alum, Chris Christie, became Governor of New Jersey, joining the &quot;epicenter&quot; of politics.<br /></div>

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An interdisciplinary major in European Studies is offered jointly by the Departments of Foreign Languages and Literatures, History, and Political Science and International Relations. The B.A. program in European Studies prepares undergraduate students as Europeanists; accordingly, it gives students a focused knowledge of the history and political institutions of a particular European country in a general European context, together with the linguistic skills required to engage in a rigorous program of research or graduate-level studies in the target country.

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<div>The Institute for Transforming Undergraduate Education promotes reform of undergraduate education through faculty development and course design. Problem-based learning and information technology for student-centered learning are current areas of emphasis.</div>

<div>The mission of the College of Arts &amp; Sciences’ Interdisciplinary Humanities Research Center (IHRC) is to strengthen faculty research and creative activity, enhance its visibility as well as its vertical integration into the curriculum, support initiatives involving multi-disciplinary research teams both within the university and with external partners, and foster intellectual community and public engagement.</div> <div>&nbsp;</div> <div>The IHRC invites proposals for creative, intellectually ambitious, multi-disciplinary research and teaching collaborations that either establish strategic new research directions at the University or further enhance established interdisciplinary research strengths. We are especially interested in projects with the potential for securing external grant funding, so that these collaborations can be sustained after the period of these internal grants. Funding is available as early as December 2011.</div> <div>&nbsp;</div> <div>Currently, we are coordinating three internal grant programs that support:</div> <div>&nbsp;</div> <ul> <li>Collaborative multi-disciplinary research (CFP and proposal template attached)</li> <li>“Integrated Semester” teaching collaborations (CFP and proposal template attached)</li> <li>Visiting Artists and Scholars programming (CFP and proposal template attached)<br /><br />For&nbsp;additional information about these grant programs, contact:<br /><br />Ann Ardis, Director, IHRC (<a href="mailto:aardis@udel.edu">aardis@udel.edu</a>; 831-2793); or Janis Tomlinson, IHRC Associate Director and Director, University Museums (<a href="mailto:jat@udel.edu">jat@udel.edu</a>; 831-8003) </li></ul> <div>&nbsp;</div> <div>UDAILY ARTICLES ABOUT THE IHRC:</div> <div><a href="http://www.udel.edu/udaily/2010/dec/ihrc121409.html">http://www.udel.edu/udaily/2010/dec/ihrc121409.html</a></div> <div><a href="http://www.udel.edu/udaily/2010/feb/ihrc022310.html">http://www.udel.edu/udaily/2010/feb/ihrc022310.html</a></div> <div>Interdisciplinary Humanities Research Center Announces Awards<br /></div>

<div>Contemporary events dramatically underscore the global significance of Islam and the global need for a better understanding of the religion of Islam, the Islamic world and the various Muslim communities that exist from Michigan to Malaysia. Islam has not only become an important force in the global cultural, political and economic sphere, it has become a crucial aspect of the American and Western experience due primarily to the growth of Muslim communities in the West. The demand for courses on Islam and the Muslim world on campus is already evident in the university’s course offerings which will constitute the Islamic studies course spectrum. Indeed, there are at least twenty courses presently offered or proposed by faculty in the College of Arts and Sciences in which students in an Islamic Studies minor could enroll to meet the suggested requirements. Clearly, a knowledge of Islam and the Islamic world is a necessary asset to make University of Delaware students competitive in a marketplace where both government careers and non-governmental and global corporations have become highly sensitive to this subject area and are seeking graduates with a background in Islamic Studies.</div>

<div>Jewish Studies explores Judaism's significant contributions to the cultural and religious heritage of the Western and non-Western worlds. Not a single discipline, Jewish Studies draws upon many disciplines: philosophy, literature, art, politics, social sciences, history, theology, and linguistics. To study Jewish thought, culture and history is to better understand the underpinnings of both Jewish and Western cultures.</div>

<div>The Latin American Studies Program offers both a B.A. and a minor designed to prepare undergraduate students for careers as Latin American studies specialists. This interdisciplinary program provides students with comprehensive training in Spanish language and literature as well as Latin American history, politics, geography, anthropology, and Portuguese. In addition, all students are encouraged to attend a semester or winter session at a Latin American site.</div>

<div>The University of Delaware, in cooperation with Delaware Technical &amp; Community College (DTCC), offers&nbsp; qualified applicants the opportunity to pursue a University of Delaware Associate in Arts (AA) degree by taking UD courses at the UD Academic Centers on the campuses of Delaware Technical &amp; Community College in Wilmington, Dover, and Georgetown. <br />The University provides advisement and academic support services for Associate Degree Program students at all sites at which instruction is provided. The Associate Degree Program is a nonresidential program; campus housing is not provided. </div> <div>The Associate Degree Program is designed specifically to increase the higher educational opportunities of resident Delawareans. Tuition for eligible students entering the Associate in Arts Program may be covered by the State of Delaware SEED (Student Excellence Equals Degree) scholarship program . The SEED program provides tuition for qualifying full-time students enrolled in either the UD Associate in Arts program as well as the associate degree programs at Delaware Technical &amp; Community College.&nbsp; More information about SEED scholarships is available on the UD SEED website, on our Frequently Asked Questions webpage, and on the State of Delaware SEED Scholarships website.</div> <div>An Associate in Arts degree can be a valuable intermediate goal, leading to the timely completion of a four-year baccalaureate degree. Earning the Associate in Arts degree represents confirmation that the student has completed approximately half of a Bachelor of Arts (BA) degree program at the University of Delaware and guarantees eligibility to continue study for a University of Delaware BA degree in many of the traditional liberal arts majors.&nbsp; <br />For more information, please contact the administrative office of the Associate in Arts Program at (302) 831-3020.<br /></div>

<p>The Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Studies (BALS) degree provides the opportunity for students to plan and pursue broader interdisciplinary programs than the normal major and minor, double major, or interdisciplinary major allows. The program is designed for students who have need and justification for developing their own undergraduate program within their 124-credit minimum. Instead of pursuing a major in one of the existing degree options of the College, a student in the BALS program will take a sequence of courses consistent with his/her stated educational goal and which will afford the student knowledge in some broad, interdisciplinary field.</p>

<div>The Plastino Scholars Program was established in 2007 by a gift from UD alumnus David A. Plastino. The program awards study grants to selected undergraduate students at the University of Delaware who exhibit extraordinary talent, promise and imagination. The grants support self-designed, off-campus learning experiences that make a transformational difference in the lives of Plastino scholars and enable them to pursue a passionate interest to a degree not otherwise possible. Normally, four Plastino scholarships will be awarded each year. The amount of each award will depend on the nature of the experience proposed. Except in unusual circumstances, the maximum individual award will be $6,000.</div>

<p>While the educational needs of most undergraduates can be readily satisfied through the selection of an appropriate major or combination of major(s) and/or minor(s), the University recognizes that for a select subset of unusually talented and motivated students, this will not be the case. Such exceptional students, driven by an overarching passion or curiosity that transcends typical disciplinary bounds and curricula, often have intellectual aspirations that would be difficult to accommodate within four years by conventional means. These interests may lead to broad interdisciplinary explorations of an issue, or to more intense, in-depth studies in a single field at a level akin to graduate work. In either case, such studies are likely to require an unusually large amount of individualized work, extensive interaction with faculty mentors, and often the academic resources of more than one college.<br /><br />Because students in this program require administrative arrangements that can be made only at the college level, the students are designated as the responsibility of the college dean, hence the designation &quot;Dean's Scholar&quot; in recognition of the special efforts made on their behalf by the college.<br /></p>

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