The College of Arts & Sciences has been entrusted with the responsibility for providing the liberal education central to the mission of Washburn University. Maintaining a standard of excellence in all of its programs, the College strives to motivate and challenge students to develop creative thinking, aesthetic awareness, and discriminating judgment, as well as a sense of purpose and a zeal for continued independent and formal learning.
Through its faculty, the College remains the advocate for liberal education as a force for adaption to an ever-changing world. Faculty commitment to the triad of teaching, scholarship and service helps guide students in specialized ways while exposing them to broad areas of knowledge encompassed by liberal education. This combination of generalized and specialized learning leads to the integrated understanding characteristic of an educated person.
Donations of any size can make a difference for the College of Arts and Sciences. Even small amounts given over time can accumulate to create substantial resources for the school. You will be recognized as a member of the College of Arts and Sciences Pythagorean Order by making an annual gift of $1,000 or more to be used for any purpose within the school.
Learn more about the different areas within the College of Arts and Sciences that your gift can support...
Anthropology
The chief concern of Anthropology is to understand culture, a peoples' total way of life. The primary focus has been on preliterate or tribal cultures. Both anthropology and sociology emphasize the external causes of human behavior.
Art
The study of Art involves both the history and making of visual artworks. Cultural background, design, technique, form and content are investigated as aspects of the creative expression.
Astronomy
Astronomy is the study of the contents of the universe, those contents' distinguishing features, composition, motion, and radiation, past and future.
Biology
Biology is the study of living things: their origin, evolution, diversity in structure and functions as well as interactions with each other and the environment.
Chemistry
Chemistry scientifically studies matter--both animate and inanimate, its structure, reactions, and associated energy changes. Synthesis of matter, molecular modeling, and prediction of chemical properties derive from observational based theory.
Communication
Communication is a vehicle which enables us to recall the past, think in the present, plan for the future, manage our relationships, and interact with our environment.
Computer Information Sciences
The study of the interrelationships of procedures, hardware, software, data, and people--which allow the computer to be used as a tool. The discipline emphasizes the development of the analytical skills needed to apply technological solutions to complex problems.
Education
The Department of Education works closely with other disciplines to assure that those preparing to become teachers have expertise in general education, the content areas they will teach, and instructional skills. The department does not offer GenEd courses. Courses in curriculum instruction, education administration, reading education and special education are included in the masters program.
Engineering
Engineering is a broad applied field which is concerned with ways to utilize mathematics and natural science for the benefit of mankind.
English
Courses in English foster habits of creative and effective self-expression and the analytical skills appropriate to a thoughtful appreciation for the ways others have expressed themselves, creatively and effectively, through poetry, story, essay, and film.
Geography
Geography is the science that describes the interactions between human life, the planet surface, natural features and resources, and non-human living systems.
Geology
The study of rock formation, landform, and mountain making movements, natural resources, geologic time, and mankind's impact on the environment.
History
History is the interpretation of the record of human experience. It is the discipline for imagining the past.
Kinesiology
Kinesiology is an academic discipline which involves the study of physical activity and its impact on health, society, and quality of life. It includes, but is not limited to, such areas of study as exercise science, sports management, athletic training and sports medicine, socio-cultural analysis of sports, sport and exercise psychology, fitness leadership, physical education-teacher education, and pre-professional training for physical therapy, occupational therapy, medicine and other heath related fields.
Mass Media
Creating messages for communication between one person or groups of persons and a large audience through a medium (radio, television, newspapers, magazines, on-line) for the purpose of educating, informing, entertaining or persuading.
Mathematics and Statistics
The study of numbers, their form, arrangement, and associated relationships using rigorously defined literal, numerical and operational symbols. Statistics deals with the collection, analysis, and interpretation of data.
Modern Languages
Languages open the world. Studying another language gives you insight into another culture and to other ways of thinking, a perspective on your own culture, insights into the functions of language, reflections back on your own language, and it will enhance your cognitive skills.
Music
Music has been both a shaping force and a reflection of culture since the beginning of recorded history. Studies in music include perceptive listening, surveys of major works, aesthetic appreciation, structure and the materials of music.
Philosophy
Philosophy is the quest for wisdom. It is, simultaneously, the seeking of wisdom, the wisdom sought, and the wisdom so far attained.
Physics
Physics treats the principles governing the inanimate world of matter and energy, force and motion, heat, electricity, light, atomic and nuclear structure.
Political Science
For good reason, Aristotle called Political Science "the queen of the sciences". It describes policies, power and life at all levels of human organization from families to terrorist groups, nations, empires and modern international organizations.
Psychology
Psychology is the study of behavior and the mind using observation and experimentation to understand how we perceive, learn, remember, feel and act.
Public Administration
Public administration is a social science, and a very large career field of employment in governments and non-profit agencies. Studying the best policies and methods of management of cities, local, state and national government agencies, non-profit agencies, and public/private partnerships, it involves the statistical and scientific study of management, implementation and evaluation of public programs and policies.
Religious Studies
The academic study of religion seeks to understand religion, however defined. It presupposes that religion embraces a host of subjects which can be explored by different academic disciplines utilizing a variety of analytical methods.
Sociology
Sociology is the study of social life and social change, especially in industrial and postindustrial societies. Both anthropology and sociology emphasize the external causes of human behavior.
Theatre
The study of Theatre Arts involves the analysis of dramatic texts and the understanding of the elements and process necessary to create crafted performances. Theatre informs, entertains, is a forum for ideas, a window through which we recognize comedy and tragedy.
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