The College of Arts and Sciences (CoAS) is one of the colleges at Drexel University

Drexel University

Drexel University is a private research university with the main campus located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA. It was founded in 1891 by Anthony J. Drexel, a noted financier and philanthropist. Drexel offers 70 full-time undergraduate programs and accelerated degrees...

. It was formed in 1990 when Drexel merged the two existing College of Sciences and College of Humanities together.

History

The importance of arts and sciences has been stressed since Drexel's founding in 1891 as the Drexel Institute of Art, Science and Industry. This is also evident in Drexel's seal, which is an equilateral triangle with Science and Industry as the sides and Art as the base. The roots of the programs currently represented by this college today can be traced to initiatives begun by departments that preceded this one throughout Drexel's history. For example, the business department was the first to offer English courses during the first year of operation. In 1914, the School of Engineering employed full professors for English, mathematics and chemistry. The College of Science was created in 1968 and the College of Humanities and Social Sciences was created in 1970.

In 1990 the present-day College of Arts and Science was created from a combination of the College of Science and the College of Humanities and Social Sciences. This consolidation was mainly a result of a downturn in enrollments and fiscal shortfalls at the time. After the merger with MCP/Hahnemann

Allegheny University of the Health Sciences

Allegheny University of the Health Sciences was formed in 1994 when the Medical College of Pennsylvania and Hahnemann University merged to form the largest private medical school in the US , under the new University of the Health Sciences, which also included schools for allied medical disciplines...

 in 2002, several departments within the college were reorganized, which resulted in the creation of the Department of Psychology, Department of Culture and Communication, and the Department of English and Philosophy. In addition, Computer Science was separated from the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science and moved to the College of Engineering and the School of Education was separated from the College of Arts and Sciences.

Present

The current structure of the college is made up of eight departments and one interdisciplinary major program that interact with each other as well as with a broad array of units throughout the university. The college's level of involvement in teaching across the university is exhibited by the fact that the college teaches approximately 35% of the total student credit hours of the university each year. The college employs 128 faculty with research expenditures exceeding $4.6 million. At the undergraduate level, the college has 15 majors (BS, BA) as well as several minor and dual-degree programs. At the graduate level, the college has seven Ph.D programs and 12 MS programs.

The CoAS offers majors and minors in 26 different areas of study and is the home of MAYA, Drexel's literary magazine. Students also have the opportunity for e-Learning an internet based learning opportunity involving different mediums such as online discussions, WebCT

WebCT

WebCT or Blackboard Learning System, now owned by Blackboard, is an online proprietary virtual learning environment system that is sold to colleges and other institutions and used in many campuses for e-learning...

, and powerpoint presentations.

Sources

• College of Arts and Sciences: About CoAS