Finding new life in history courses
What's My Why?
“I wasn’t able to go the traditional course of going through high school. Getting this degree, it doesn’t, for me, mean more money. But it is going to mean something that I was able to start and complete that I actually wanted to do for myself.”
Jason Butler always appreciated a good education, but the school schedule worked against him. Getting up early for high school classes is nearly impossible when dilapidating sleep apnea keeps you awake.
Still, he was determined to find another way forward, so he decided to go after a GED instead.
With that, and skills that bolstered an otherwise thin resume, he landed a good job in the technology industry. Butler had the financial support he needed, but wasn't satisfied.
“That monetary value that we tie into things, that’s not really valuable to me,” he said. “What is valuable is being able to have the knowledge and the subject area that speaks to you. To be able to study something that moves you, I think that’s more so what we’re here for. … And to be able to study those things on an advanced level and really get specialized insight into those areas that really excite us, I don’t think that there’s any number that you can put on that. It’s really an invaluable experience.”
For Butler, the subject that enlivens him is history. It’s not the major he chose when he first came to The University of Baltimore. After a few general education courses in the subject, though, he was smitten. And changing from one pre-law major, Philosophy, Law, and Ethics, to another didn’t remove the possibility of his going to law school. He wants to keep his options open.
Butler’s main prize, however, is to gain what he lost when he left high school—a chance to walk in a commencement ceremony with his family cheering him on.
“Getting this degree, it doesn’t, for me, mean more money. But it is going to mean something that I was able to start and complete that I actually wanted to do for myself,” said Butler, a first-generation college student. “I have four kids. I’ve lived a life of making sure that other people have the things that they want and they need. This is something that I’m doing for me.”
From his first history courses at UBalt, Butler was seeing the subject in a new light.
Dr. Joshua Davis wasn’t lecturing from a dusty book but writing new ones and talking about history as it’s happening now, Butler noted. Activism, urban law enforcement and civil rights struggles are stories in today’s news and topics in UBalt’s history courses.
Davis’ course on Prisons and Police in U.S. History helped Butler weigh his personal experiences against a broader understanding.
“You can really see where things are and how close we are to the origins,” he said. “We’re much closer to the origins of policing in this country than what people realize. Criminal justice systems are not as evolved and developed as we’d like to think that they are.”
Dr. Nicole Hudgins’ class, Historian’s Toolkit, had Butler researching his ancestral history. He found it to be a difficult but worthwhile challenge.
“For a lot of African Americans, that presents a huge challenge, and just to be able to get access to a lot of those resources… I mean, the class means a lot to everyone; I think that it does hold a special significance to African Americans who are disconnected from previous generations. They don’t know how much information is out there.”
Butler is still writing his own story, and his classes are helping him find his direction. While a law career is still an option he’s holding for himself, he is also interested in life as a historian.
“If I can work as a historian and find some way to positively impact people’s lives, that’s what I’m here for,” he said. “When I’m doing research for any history class, it doesn’t feel like work. It just speaks to me as a person, and so, I’m really grateful to have the professors and to have the structure that really kind of helped me to realize that.”