Current instructor

Laird Boswell

/5Adjusted rating
/5RMP difficulty
captured reviews
About this rating

Raw average: 4.31/5 from 48 quality ratings. The adjusted rating blends this with the UW review average (3.66/5), weighted as 20 additional ratings. Smaller samples stay closer to that average. Each captured review is counted once in the prior; this does not correct who chooses to leave a review.

RMP profile ↗ · All captured review dates; profile matched by name.

What students say

Original student reviews · all captured dates

HIST359 · course not matched
Quality 5/5Difficulty 3/5
An amazing lecturer. Definitely history heavy, so if you don't really enjoying learning about history, I would skip out on this course. But as a history major, Professor Boswell was a really fantastic instructor. Readings can get dense throughout the semester, but other than that, the workload is quite light for this course. Highly recommend!
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HIS120 · course not matched
Quality 5/5Difficulty 3/5
Prof. Bowsell is amazing lecturer and he makes history extremely engaging. He also is very funny and often would tell us personal accounts of the historical topics we are going over in class which is super cool. This class has 2 major papers but other than that it isnt a burden and I often just had to read interesting books.
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HIS120 · course not matched
Quality 5/5Difficulty 3/5
Great lecturer. Manages to keep things engaging and can be kind of funny, but you definitely have to somewhat like history to enjoy the class. LOTS of reading (like a book a week, but you can sparknotes a bunch of them) and frequent papers. TA is much more responsible for your grade than Boswell is
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HIS359 · course not matched
Quality 5/5Difficulty 3/5
I can't speak to his assignments or grading since I was just auditing the course, but he is a terrific lecturer! I thoroughly enjoyed this course.
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HIS120 · course not matched
Quality 5/5Difficulty 3/5
One of the best lecturers I've ever seen - he makes the content very interesting to listen to. However, would not recommend taking this class as a graduation requirement for STEM majors since the workload can be pretty significant - very reading and essay intensive
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HIS120 · course not matched
Quality 5/5Difficulty 4/5
Professor Boswell is one of the best professors I have had here at Madison. He is very passionate about the material he teaches and makes lectures engaging for students. However, the course is extremely heavy with reading material, as you are expected to read a full book every week. Would recommend for those into history/reading
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Personal experiences, not a representative survey. Profile matching and captured coverage are shown in the source details.

Classes with Laird Boswell

HISTORY 682

Senior Honors Thesis

1–3 credits

HISTORY 682 is a mentored independent research and thesis writing course for honors students, requiring concurrent enrollment in HISTORY 680.

Offering recorded · Fall 2026

Recent recorded grades — Spring 2022: 0.00 GPA, 0.0% A/AB (n=1 letter grades).

Stephen KantrowitzAllison Useche+34 more

historical GPA · grades

Spring 2022–Spring 2022 · limited sample
HISTORY 699

Directed Study

1–4 credits

HISTORY 699 is a directed study course allowing students to conduct independent research under faculty supervision.

Offering recorded · Fall 2026

Stephen KantrowitzGiuliana Chamedes+44 more

historical GPA · grades

Spring 2022–Spring 2022 · limited sample
HISTORY 999

Independent Work

1–6 credits

HISTORY 999 is an independent work course involving directed study under faculty supervision.

Offering recorded · Fall 2026

Stephen KantrowitzGiuliana Chamedes+54 more

historical GPA · grades

Spring 2022–Spring 2022 · limited sample

Recorded teaching history

Explore courses taught by this instructor →
Browse recorded courses
TermCourseTitle
Fall 2026HISTORY 681Senior Honors Thesis
Fall 2026HISTORY 682Senior Honors Thesis
Fall 2026HISTORY 691Senior Thesis
Fall 2026HISTORY 692Senior Thesis
Fall 2026HISTORY 698Directed Study
Fall 2026HISTORY 699Directed Study
Fall 2026HISTORY 990Research and Thesis
Fall 2026HISTORY 999Independent Work

Teaching history may be incomplete. Course pages contain course-specific feedback and citations.

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