历史系具有公共历史重点的文学硕士为学生在博物馆，历史组织，公园，档案馆和其他文化机构的职业发展作准备。重点将历史研究中的严格指导与可转让的专业技能的实践培训相结合。“公共历史重点课程”还利用堪萨斯城的许多历史机构提供有资金和没有资金的实习机会，为学生提供了一些在现实世界中工作的机会。
The Department of History offers a traditional M.A. with an academic focus that prepares students for careers in a variety of fields. The M.A. in History prepares students in the intellectual foundations of the discipline while training them for a career in a variety of fields, including education, government, law and public history. All M.A. students receive the same rigorous instruction in historical scholarship, thinking and research methods. The program culminates in a final independent original research project focused on a topic in the student's field of interest. Students can choose a Public History emphasis as part of their M.A. degree. This concentration is focused on bridging historical thinking, research and scholarship to the foundations and methods that shape historical interpretation for public audiences. The Public History emphasis connects students to Kansas City's rich network of historical and cultural institutions, offering several opportunities for real-world work experience through partnerships as well as funded and unfunded internships<br>Students graduating from this program will:<br><br>apply the ethical standards that govern the practice of public history in their scholarly and professional work.<br>demonstrate the ability to execute a public history project.<br>demonstrate the ability to interpret history for public audiences.<br>demonstrate the ability to collaborate on a public history project.<br>recognize, demonstrate, and apply in-depth knowledge of the world's civilizations and peoples as well as their political, economic, social, and cultural histories.<br>relate the events in their particular historic story to the general history of the topic, and students relate their interpretations to existing historiography.<br>demonstrate the ability to independently develop original scholarly inquiry, systematically researching the topic using appropriate primary and/or secondary sources.<br>be able to use primary and secondary sources to independently construct an original historical interpretation: demonstrating competency in identifying a problem, posing a hypothesis, proposing a methodology, offering an interpretation of the evidence, and making an original contribution to scholarly debates.<br>be able to compose and present clear, well-organized, properly documented, and grammatical prose in a form appropriate for scholarly publication.<br>be able to appraise alternative readings of the past and connect them to their research in new holistic interpretations that offer new avenues for research or application to other studies.