I met with the director of the first year experience course that I teach every fall and she agreed to me reviving the "primary and secondary sources" class next time instead of my usual generic first year class ("building your academic plan"). If we can't get enough students in it, I'll still have a teaching assignment (they love me over there), but I'm going to find every way to promote this course!
I'm super excited to make it my own too. We spend the first few weeks talking about evaluating current news and media, then transition to historical sources (for his transition, I plan a lecture on doctored and staged photographs).
I've decided to streamline the final project by not letting it be open ended (pick any topic in the archives). Our archives has all of the university's yearbooks, student handbooks, student newspapers, etc. so I'm going to let the students pick a year and their final paper will be an essay on what it was like to be a student in that year. The University even has an Alumni networking service for students that they could use to interview someone if they want.
To AI proof it, the essay will be drafted over the last month of class, with an annotated bibliography, an outline, a first draft, an in person consultation, a final draft, and a presentation.
It's really falling into place as something that will benefit them as students, but also giving them lots of knowledge about the University itself (the libraries, history, student clubs, alumni, etc).
