College of the Pacific

Why choose a History degree at Pacific?

Professor Greg Rohlf brings history to life for students in his East Asian Civilization class by arranging a demonstration from a tai chi master.

Our History program at Pacific offers range and depth in our course offerings and a chance to study in small classes with great faculty members who love what they do. We also offer students the opportunity to do research they are interested in under faculty guidance.

Through our foundation courses, we make sure our students have the knowledge and skills they need to succeed in subsequent courses.

Our Historical Imagination course, which students take as sophomores, trains students in the historian’s craft, preparing them further for course work and their own future research.

A few of our students share their thoughts on Pacific’s History program:

“Your professors become your friends. I regularly attend office hours and have even found my professors open to mentoring independent study research projects. This closeness with faculty is not something you find at larger or less student-oriented universities.”
—Lloyd Barba

“I feel it is important that our faculty have such a large breadth of interests and skills to offer. The department offers many regions, time periods and even specialty courses. We even have the History of Food!”
—Elizabeth Youngberg

“I love Pacific’s History program because it isn’t just disconnected classes about different regions and time periods. The sophomore Historical Imagination class ties concepts in history together; the class explores history’s interdisciplinary nature, its applicability in movies and culture, and historiography in general. Then senior year, the Capstone brings History majors together once again to complete hands-on research in the discipline.”

—Sachi Takahashi-Rial