Interdepartmental courses records

Interdepartmental courses were first developed in 1954 with the creation of a Psychology/Sociology course and an Economics and Political Science course. In 1956 a course titled "Atomic Energy: Its Uses and Implications for Society" was created. It was a combined effort of the physics, Economics, and Political Science departments. Also in 1956 a course called "Concepts of Social Behavior" was created to examine the works of Darwin, Marx, and Freud. The Economics, Psychology, and Zoology departments were all involved in this course. In 1968, the Economics and Sociology departments created a course called "The Urbanization of the American Negro". No new interdepartmental courses were created until 1984 when the "Case Studies in Quantitative Reasoning" course was developed. It spanned seven departments including the Economics, Sociology and Anthropology, Mathematics, Chemistry and Computer Science, Psychology and Education, Biology, and History departments. Then in 1993 the "Pasts and Presences in the West" course was created by many varied departments including German, History, Astronomy, Politics, Art, Geology, Biology, English, and French. In 1993 a course was created called "Unity of Science" which combined the Astronomy, Geology and Biology departments. The interdepartmental courses developed by Mount Holyoke were part of a grant funded project related to the development of interdepartmental curriculum. They led to the creation of more interdisciplinary courses at Mount Holyoke and other colleges around the nation.