2014-2015 Academic Catalog 
    
    Mar 28, 2024  
2014-2015 Academic Catalog [ARCHIVED CATALOG]

Departments and Offices



Academic Department Listing

Undergraduate Programs and Departments

Graduate Programs and Departments

Legend

red leaf icon = Undergraduate concentration

green leaf icon = Undergraduate concentration and Ph.D. program in Holocaust and Genocide Studies

 

 Academic Support Services

Leep Center

The LEEP Center provides the guidance, resources, and support necessary for students to identify and achieve their personal and professional goals. The LEEP Center is home to Academic Advising, Career Services, Community Engagement, Innovation and Entrepreneurship, Study Abroad, and the Writing Center.

The staff in the LEEP Center also serves as advisors to students, complementing the work of the pre-major and major advisers. Each first year student will be assigned a LEEP Center advisor, who will meet with the student individually and in groups throughout the student’s tenure at Clark. Students will be able to rely on their LEEP Center and their advisor for guidance regarding: interest exploration; major declaration; leadership and personal skills development; experiential learning opportunities, including internships; and preparation for post-baccalaureate options. The LEEP Center is located on the first and second floor of Dana Commons.

 

Academic Advising

 Academic Advising  provides general academic advising services and adviser assignments. Students are invited to meet with a staff member for academic advice or for assistance in deciding upon a major. Evaluation of transfer credit and College Board petitions for exception to any academic policy are coordinated through the center, as are all cases involving possible breaches of academic integrity.

 

Disability Services

The Office of Disability Services is designed to foster functional independence for students with disabilities. Both the Director of Disability Services and the Disability Services Advisor provide academic advising and help to students, who have submitted appropriate disability documentation, to negotiate reasonable accommodations.

 

English as a Second Language: American Language and Culture Institute (ALCI)

If English is not your first language and you are having a difficult time with your classes as a result, you should contact ALCI. A variety of noncredit ESL classes are offered at up to five levels of instruction. Undergraduates who take the Verbal Expression placement test at Orientation may be required to take one or both of the following writing courses offered by ALCI: Pre-Academic Writing (ESL 0150, noncredit) and Expository Writing for Nonnative Speakers of English (ESL 0155, credit).

For more information about ALCI classes and/or programs, call ALCI at 508.793.7794.

 

Research Centers and Institutes

The Adam Institute for Urban Teaching and School Practice has a special charge to develop, support, and understand teaching that puts all students, especially those who are underprepared and underrepresented, on a path to college. In meeting this goal, the Institute strives to develop and understand powerful models of urban teacher preparation, teaching practice, and college-going learning cultures which are based as much in communities as schools. This innovative work occurs primarily in collaboration with partner schools in Worcester’s Main South neighborhood, with Clark’s Hiatt Center for Urban Education an important research partner. The work encompasses Clark’s Master of Arts in Teaching program, which is a carefully constructed gradual immersion in practice in partner schools.

Clark Labs for Cartographic Technologies and Geographic Analysis, best known for its flagship product, the IDRISI GIS and Image Processing software, is dedicated to the research and development of geospatial technologies for effective and responsible decision making for environmental management, sustainable resource development, and equitable resource allocation. Clark Labs leverages its academic base to develop innovative and customized research tools, provide software solutions to organizations in need, and apply geospatial expertise to a range of real-world problems.

The George Perkins Marsh Institute conducts transformative research on relationships between humans and their surrounding natural, technological and socioeconomic environments. Among the hallmarks of the Institute is collaborative, systems-based research that challenges traditional disciplinary boundaries to address global challenges such as climate change mitigation and adaptation, urban sustainability, human development, and socio-technical transitions to sustainability. Focal areas of the Institute include earth system science; socio-ecological and sustainability science; and urban/economic systems.

The Higgins School of Humanities enhances the intellectual and cultural life of Clark University by fostering connections between the humanities disciplines (English, Foreign Languages, History, Philosophy, and Visual and Performing Arts). The School integrates co-curricular activities and classroom learning with faculty development, pedagogical innovation, and substantive research. Each semester, the Higgins School offers a thematic dialogue symposium in addition to lectures and readings from the African American Intellectual Culture Series, the Frontiers in the Humanities Series, the Higgins Faculty Series and the Modern Poetry Series. Other significant and ongoing initiatives include: research collaboratives on early modernist studies, the digital humanities, and science fiction film and literature; the Difficult Dialogues program; and the Council on the Uncertain Human Future.

The Jacob Hiatt Center for Urban Education, This research center connects scholars, practitioners, and youth in the development of educational environments that advance our understanding of powerful learning and teaching in urban settings. The goal is to create spaces where research and practice co-develop in ways that exemplify new possibilities for community-building, knowledge creation, and impact through collaborative action. The work of the Center encompasses the worlds of schools, local neighborhoods and national/international networks, and expanding virtual and digital spaces.

The Mosakowski Institute for Public Enterprise focuses on the creation and dissemination of new knowledge that can be put to use in addressing important public issues. The Institute supports Clark faculty in analyzing important issues in actual contexts, often in partnership with the practitioners charged with solving public problems. Because these problems cut across academic disciplinary boundaries, Mosakowski’s work does as well. Examples of the Institute’s work to bridge theory and practice include the annual Family Impact Seminars, where Clark faculty and students compile and present current research on family policy topics to Massachusetts state legislators and their staffs; the NOAA Fellows program, through which Clark students spend their summers engaged in projects with NOAA scientists and policy analysts around the U.S.; and the research projects in the field of urban education supported by the Institute’s Dr. Lee Gurel ‘48 Education Endowment.

The Strassler Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies is an intellectually dynamic forum for education and scholarship about the Holocaust, the Armenian genocide, and other genocides around the world. Dedicated to teaching, research, and public service, the center offers the only Ph.D. in Holocaust history and genocide studies in the country, training the next generation of Holocaust and genocide historians, scholars, teachers, museum directors and curators, and experts in nongovernmental organizations and government agencies.