Online Bachelor of Arts in HistoryOnline Bachelor of Arts in HistoryOnline Bachelor of Arts in History

Let your curiosity about the past drive your future.

Your curiosity drives you to find a deeper understanding of our society — about where we came from, and how we got here. The past helps give us the perspective to understand our present and boldly look toward the future.

At Maryville, we offer a 100% online bachelor’s in history designed to be versatile, innovative, and interactive. Our career-focused coursework helps you master the tools and techniques that modern history professionals use to research, communicate, analyze, and educate. When you earn your history degree at Maryville, you can tailor your coursework to fit your personal, educational, and professional goals, so you can turn your love of history into a meaningful career, or use it as a springboard toward exciting new opportunities.

We’re here to support you from application through graduation and beyond. Whether you choose to pursue graduate education or explore career opportunities in fields like public history, politics, education, government, law, nonprofit advocacy, and more, we want to give you the tools and knowledge to be brave and pursue your goals.

View our program guide for more information.

Get Curriculum Details

Access coursework 100% online

Choose to start in fallspring, or summer

Connect to our faculty of active business leaders

Apply with no application fee or entrance exams

Explore financial aid and eligible transfer credits options

Gain Early Access eligibility – get a head start on your graduate degree

Why earn your online B.A. in History?

The professional focus of Maryville’s online B.A. in History is what sets our program apart. When you earn your online history degree with us, you’ll have the opportunity to work with expert faculty members who are passionate about history, and who have the industry experience to help you make the most of your education.

Here, you can study social and cultural histories, or dive deep into relevant topics like the history of science and medicine, so you can discover the greater meaning and connection between events — and put them in context with today’s headlines. You can build career skills in areas like research, writing, oral communication, critical analysis, and digital literacy, which you can apply in almost any professional field, from education to tech.

Our program helps you leverage your natural curiosity to develop skills that help you contextualize and analyze history, from the local to the global. Get real-world experience by choosing an internship to help you expand your professional connections while practicing in the field, and participate in a local history seminar to give your education a personal, meaningful slant.

Your online history degree culminates in your portfolio project which you can tailor with the help of our expert faculty to prepare you for graduate studies or to impress prospective employers. All this serves to build critical thinking skills and a knowledge base that you can apply to your career, wherever it takes you.

Flexible, affordable, adaptable

100% online coursework.
No campus visits required.

Practical, experiential learning.
Gain relevant, career-oriented experience from your local history seminar and internship.

Engage with our supportive faculty.
Discuss your goals with our dedicated faculty, who help you connect the curriculum to your career vision.

Study at a respected university.
Join Maryville University, which ranks among Forbes’ “America’s Top Colleges” and the best values in private colleges by Kiplinger’s Personal Finance.

What can you do with a history major?

History is always relevant, everywhere. At Maryville University, we designed our online history degree to focus on broad, career-focused competencies with global application. Your online history degree can be personalized to focus on your personal, educational, and professional goals.

You can pursue a career in a variety of settings, including:

  • Historical societies
  • Museums
  • Schools/universities
  • Community centers
  • Nonprofit organizations
  • Research centers
  • Public archives
  • Private enterprises
  • Technology companies
  • Government agencies
  • Consulting firms
  • Libraries
  • Government agencies
  • Consulting firms
  • Libraries

Titles and career opportunities for online history degree grads include:

  • Government historian
  • Teacher
  • Archives director
  • Curator
  • Records manager
  • University archivist
  • Journalist/commentator
  • Docent
  • Lecturer
  • Communications specialist
  • Researcher
  • Museum educator
  • Analyst

What’s the market outlook for B.A. in History graduates?

Spike in public interest.* 
An overall increase in public interest in history has led to higher-than-average projected growth in jobs for curators, archivists, and museum technicians (11%), according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). For online history degree students who pursue postgraduate study, there’s also a higher-than-average projected increase in demand for postsecondary history teachers (9%).

Potential for higher earnings.*
Earning your online history degree can help you qualify for jobs with competitive pay. While salaries vary depending on factors like experience level and location, there are attractive median salaries for jobs like state government historian ($63,680), and curator ($49,850), according to the BLS. Salaries tend to be higher on average in education and government roles.

History skills in demand.*
As more people turn to the internet as a tool, demand for digital records has led the BLS to project that there will be more jobs created for archivists who can manage digital collections — and not just in expected fields like education or curation. In fact, data from the American Community Survey suggests that these fields comprise about 18% of history major jobs, with a significant number of grads working in diverse fields like business/science/art management (15%), legal (11%), sales (10%), arts/entertainment/sports/media (4%), and more.**

*Career growth and salary figures from data compiled by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics
**Employment statistics from data compiled by the American Community Survey

Your curiosity drives you. Ours drives us, too. That’s why our interactive, innovative, and career-oriented B.A. in History program is taught by experts in the field who are passionate about studying the past, forging connections with the modern world, and sharing insights with enthusiastic students like you.

Your online bachelor’s in history can help you excel as a historian, but the multitude of skills you develop are transferable across many fields. Wherever archival skills, analytical and contextual knowledge, strong communication and storytelling, cultural understanding, resourcefulness, and the ability to forge connections are valued, history majors can find employment. That means your online history degree can lead to careers in academia, in galleries and museums, at nonprofits, in government and public service, at tech startups and private corporations, in communications, and in virtually any other sector.

Our practical online history degree makes your education an ongoing discussion between you and your instructors. When you earn your degree at Maryville, you get direct access to our expert faculty, who share internship and career opportunities as they use their experience in and knowledge of the field to help you find your professional footing. In addition, you can align your degree to your educational or professional goals with relevant courses and career-focused experiences that build your cultural understanding and add context to the world today. All of this is designed to help you prepare for growth as a history professional, whether that means building your history portfolio or preparing for graduate school.

Maryville University was founded in 1872 and has been dedicated to providing accessible, high-quality education ever since. We have a demonstrated history of caring for and service to our students, and we judge our success by yours. Ninety percent of our full-time faculty members hold a PhD or the highest degree in their field. We’re proud of our reputation for quality academics and affordability, because it shows our devotion to helping students like you advance.

We’re continually recognized for excellence:

Kiplinger Best College Values Logo
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Online B.A. in History Curriculum

The online Bachelor of Arts in History is designed with an eye toward flexibility, so you can tailor your program to fit your career goals or help prepare you to pursue further education. The program comprises 128 credit hours, including general education (42 credits), your history major (36 credits), and general electives (50 credits).

Our career-focused program is designed to help you develop skills to succeed in graduate school, or to excel in the field of history — and beyond. It features relevant coursework that explores current events and the world today through the lens of our cultural and social history and heritage. As you earn your history degree, you’ll participate in two world history survey courses and an experiential, professional learning component. You’ll also have the flexibility to tailor your educational experience by choosing courses that align with your personal, educational, and professional goals and interests.

Coursework includes the following:

History Survey Courses
Get an overview of world history through two required survey courses, then add context with an in-depth study of American history. Choose from topics like pre- and post-Reconstruction American history, women in American history, post-war foreign policy, and government.

History Elective Courses
Build your breadth of history knowledge with five elective courses focused on world culture and science. Choose from classes like From Samurai to Sima Qian: East Asian Peoples, Politics, and Cultures; The History of Western Medicine: From Plague to Penicillin; Conquest, Resistance, Independence: Latin American History, Politics, and Culture; and more.

Experiential Component
Get direct and relevant professional experience with this 12-credit sequence. Participate in an internship, learn about your community’s history through a local history seminar, and study historical methods and digital humanities. Your experience culminates in the creation of a history portfolio that can help prepare you for grad school or to begin your career.

Maryville’s online history degree program aligns with the American Historical Association’s History Discipline Core, which means you study history with the intent to preserve the past and keep the public informed. It’s a flexible program that gives you options to explore areas of history that interest you most. Here, you can learn to challenge accepted knowledge by analyzing texts, artifacts, and images, then develop skills to connect people to a deeper human story.

Get started on your graduate education with Early Access

At Maryville University, you can get a head start on your graduate degree while earning your bachelor’s in history through our Early Access program.

With Early Access, you can earn up to 12 credits that count toward your master’s degree and your bachelor’s. Credits you earn through Early Access are charged at the undergraduate tuition rate, meaning you can save time and money on your graduate education.

To qualify for Early Access, you must be a current Maryville undergraduate student, and you must have completed at least 75 credit hours with a GPA of 3.25 or better.

If you qualify and you have not yet completed your elective requirements, we invite you to contact your academic advisor to explore Early Access and learn more about some of our exciting online graduate programs.

You can get more out of your bachelor’s in history by pairing it with one of the following master’s degrees:

Master of Science in Data Science: This program features high-level courses in machine learning, data mining, big data, and deep learning to help you build proficiency in the most in-demand areas of the modern data science world.

Master’s in Business Administration (MBA): Tailor this program to align with your career goals. Select from twelve concentrations, including Health Administration and General Management.

Master of Arts in Management and Leadership (MAML): This program is designed to help you prepare for a senior-level management position in your desired field.

Apply to the online bachelor’s in history degree program at Maryville University.

Be Brave

Bring us your ambition and we’ll guide you along a personalized path to a quality education that’s designed to change your life.