Tuning the discipline of history in the United States: Harmony (and dissonance) in teaching and learning

Abstract

Tuning's progress in the discipline of history in the United States since 2009 illustrates the project's continuing capacity to develop “educational structures and programmes on the basis of diversity and autonomy”, maintaining the initiative's original European Union commitment in a markedly different academic environment across the Atlantic. Struggling initially against a backdrop of confusion, hesitancy, and resistance among US faculty, Tuning has been adopted by a steadily expanding number of educators in individual institutions, state systems, and the history discipline's premier professional society. Though operating, at times, in an uneven, imprecise, or pro forma manner, Tuning in the US manages to address several important goals: bringing a more coherent frame of reference to scattered conversations about higher education; framing a more meaningful discussion about the knowledge, skills, and non-monetized “value” developed through higher education; focusing on the central role of faculty discipline experts in the work of assessment, accreditation, and accountability; and engaging professional scholarly societies on questions of teaching and learning.