After serving as interim dean since January, Cal State Fullerton history professor and author Jessica Yirush Stern has been named dean of the university’s College of Humanities and Social Sciences as of June 1. A member of the Titan community since 2007, Stern has also served as associate dean for student relations and as chair of the Department of History.
Stern credits her journey to becoming a historian for much of her vision in this new role. A self-described shy person whose father was a lawyer and mother a microbiologist, she approached her undergraduate studies at Reed College, a small, liberal arts school in Portland, Oregon, as an exploratory experience. After taking an early American history general education course, she was drawn to the idea of pursuing history as a career path.
“Once I realized that what history is trying to understand is what are the conditions that allow folks to change their mind or societies to change their mind, or what are the conditions that prevent change from happening, I looked at it more as the social and intellectual and cultural changes and continuities,” Stern said. “I fell in love with history.”
Once Stern arrived at CSUF, she found a community within the Department of History that was creative, vibrant, innovative and nurturing. Although she figured she would spend her time primarily working solo in the dusty archives, she discovered a strong interest in developing curriculum that aims to help students thrive. As such, she joined several general education committees on campus and found herself on the administrative path.
“As I got older in my profession, I realized that I actually did like working with people more,” Stern said. “It occurred to me that going into administration might be a better path for me because it gave me more opportunities to work collaboratively with people.”
One of the key programs Stern has helped develop in the general education sphere is CSUF’s Explore Core, courses that challenge students to not look at general education classes as strictly “filler,” but as opportunities to explore various topics through a range of different instructors and lenses.
“Instead of it being ancillary and something you just tack on, if you take general education seriously, you are learning how to approach problems from multidirections,” Stern said.
Another of Stern’s contributions to the university while in the associate dean role is Passage to the Future, a program for humanities and social sciences students to more seamlessly connect with employment opportunities. This effort feeds into one of her main goals as dean –
to dispel the myth that humanities and social science degrees don’t have a career path and to show both students and community members what those career paths are.
“When you look at the data of what businesses say they need, they say they want somebody who communicates well, who’s a critical thinker and who knows how to do data analysis,” said Stern. “Our students in the humanities and social sciences are broadly trained in those skills.”
Another area of focus for Stern, and one where she sees some real momentum building, is making sure that the College of Humanities and Social Sciences is more connected to the community.
“Even though the signature of the humanities is to help folks answer these very central questions, like what is value, what is justice, what is truth, as a lot of our academic fields have developed, we’ve gained a reputation for just speaking to ourselves and not being legible to a general public,” Stern said. “I want to dispel that, and I want to start opening up our doors to more community events.”
As an example, Stern helped bring a lecture panel to campus last fall that discussed Gaza, Hamas and Israel, one of the first of its kind locally at the time. She also sees opportunities for storytelling and connection through CSUF’s Lawrence de Graaf Center for Oral and Public History.
“At the core, the humanities are trying to look at how people tell stories, how society tells stories,” Stern said. “We’re training students in the art of storytelling, story collecting, and having them go back to their communities and collect and highlight these stories.”
With more than 8,500 graduate and undergraduate students, 19 departments and 44 degree paths, the College of Humanities and Social Sciences is one of the largest colleges on campus, and Stern is looking forward to seeing how both the college and the university will continue to be a catalyst for achieving excellence through diversity.
“I think one of the things that makes Cal State Fullerton and the College of Humanities so remarkable is that our excellence is rooted in our diversity and our ability to nurture, inspire and help enable our students,” Stern said. “Our academic fields push into new directions because we are bringing diverse voices into those fields and pushing those fields forward.”
