AAAS Opportunities

AAAS Honors Program

AAAS offers a special program leading to Honors in African and African American Studies. Students accepted to this program will complete an honors thesis on an approved topic, on which work will normally begin in the junior year and be completed by mid-May of the senior year. The honors thesis is intended to enable students to synthesize skills to produce a document or project demonstrating a measure of competence in their specialty.

The Honors program begins with extensive advising from the faculty advisor and a petition for Honors, approved no later than the spring quarter of the junior year. Students must enroll in AFRICAAM 200X. AAAS Senior Seminar is during the fall of the senior year and may take up to an additional 10 units of honors work to be distributed as best fits the student's program. Senior Research units are taken in addition to the required courses for the major. In May of the senior year, Honors students share their research findings in a public presentation to which faculty and students are invited.

Majors who have maintained a grade point average (GPA) of at least 3.5 in the major may apply for the honors program. Forms are available in the AAAS office.


Undergraduate Awards

 

Public Policy Leadership Institute

The annual Public Policy Leadership Institute, offered through CSRE, is a two-week long residence-based seminar, taught by a faculty member.  It provides students with exposure to major public policy issues directly affecting ethnic and racial groups in the United States. Participants have an opportunity for intensive and focused study of policies at the state and national levels and have contact with several Bay Area and California state leaders. The Institute seeks to provide perspectives on what it takes to be a leader in a diverse society and to foster an intellectual and social community among the participants.


Service Learning

AAAS and CSRE Majors plan with Dr. Tania Mitchell to create service-learning opportunities related to race studies.

Fieldtrips

AAAS Majors and Minors go “off the farm” to explore local cultural centers and museums and attend visual and performance art events related to Africana Studies. Students have visited the Museum of the African Diaspora, dined in local Caribbean and Creole restaurants, and viewed plays by prominent African American playwrights.


Expeditions

The AAAS Learning Expeditions were started in 1999 with the help of a seed grant from the President's Office to increase students' awareness of the rich and multi-faceted nature of the Black Experience around the United States and the world. The expeditions, which usually take place over the Spring break, have taken groups ranging from 30 to 50 to the Sea Islands off the Coast of S. Carolina and Georgia (1999), Jamaica (2000), Ghana (2001), Belize (2003), Harlem (2006) and Paris (2007). In 2010 AAAS Majors and Minors will have an opportunity to attend an expedition related to the Race Forward theme of Race and the Environment.


Community Research Summer Internship (CRSI)

Students conduct research directly related to academic interests and that benefits a particular community. Research is based on participation in a paid summer internship.  Applications are administered through CSRE.