Clio’s Scroll, the Berkeley Undergraduate History Journal, is published twice yearly by students of the Department of History at the University of California, Berkeley. The journal aims to provide undergraduates with the opportunity to publish historical works, develop the editing and writing skills of contributors and board members, and train them in the editorial process of an academic journal.
Clio’s Scroll is produced by financial support from the Townsend Center for the Humanities, the Associated Students of the University of California (ASUC), and Berkeley’s Department of History. The journal is formally independent of the Department of History at Berkeley and is not an official publication of its funders. Student editors make all editorial and organizational decisions and carry out day-to-day operations. The views expressed in the articles are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of the journal, the editors, the university, or sponsors. The journal publishes articles by undergraduates and recent graduates of any university, so long as the submissions are historical in nature. Clio’s Scroll is led by an editor-in-chief and managing editor (the executive editors), staffed by several associate editors, and guided by an advisory board composed of alumni, faculty, and affiliates. Founded in 1981, Clio’s Scroll has published over thirty issues. In 2015-16 (volume 17), the executive editors changed the overall organization and brand of the journal. Prior to this transformative moment, the journal was like other undergraduate journals, working with unchanging templates, poor visual design, poor organization, no cite-checking protocols, and no consistency. Today, it is arguably the most professional undergraduate journal in history, taking seriously the editorial and cite-checking processes. An advisory board was also started to maintain guidance on the high-turnover of the editorial board.
