Art history department advertises unconventionally

In recent weeks the art history department has posted 500 fliers on Main Street and around campus, hoping to increase enrollment for its spring semester introductory level classes.

Professor Nina Kallmyer, chairperson of the art history department, said due to decreasing enrollment over the past decade, the department has decided to make the field more visible to the student body by advertising with fliers.

"There seemed to be a peak enrollment around the year 2000 and then we got into a slump," Kallmyer said.

Feeling the economic downturn, she said she believes students are turning to more practical disciplines that will put them on a conventional career path.

"I think parents and their children feel that if we have to invest in college we better invest in something concrete," Kallmyer said. "I get that a lot from parents."

She said if the department can get freshmen to take art history courses to fulfill breadth requirements, they will come to appreciate what the courses teach them even if the material not directly applicable to a career after graduation.

"If you are a professional in any other field it helps to have this kind of background," Kallmyer said.

Senior and art major Daniel Klein said he intends to go on to graduate school and is thinking about becoming an art history professor or working in an auction house. Klein said even if he doesn't end up in a field directly related to art history, he would be okay with it.

He said he discovered the major his freshman year after he decided his originally declared communication major was not a good fit for him.

"I took whatever classes I wanted and one of them was an art history 101 class," Klein said. "I just thought it was really interesting because it was philosophical as well as historical at the same time, so I declared the major and took more classes from there."

With little or no art history classes offered in high school, the department has found that students are either unaware of the field or are reluctant to take classes in a subject that isn't familiar, Kallmyer said.

Each year, only three or four freshmen declare art history as a major, Kallmyer said, and the number of majors grows exponentially from there. Currently the department has 70 to 80 student majors, she said.

Because exposure to art history at the introductory level is so important to the growth of the major, the department does not want freshmen to pass by art history when they are taking classes to fulfill their group requirements, Kallmyer said.

She said this past summer at DelaWorld, the art history department handed out fliers advertising their introductory level classes and saw a 30 percent increase in class enrollment from the same time last year.

The goal of the fliers is to continue the increase in enrollment that was seen this fall, Kallmyer said. One flyer advertises 100-level classes intended to reach freshmen who didn't take art history classes this fall, and another is advertising 200-level courses for students who want to continue with art history studies, she said.

 "We wanted the fliers to capture the eye wherever students go — public spaces or classrooms," Kallmyer said. "So the reasoning was, see where the students march and follow and paste one of them."