The Department of English and Philosophy has a two-fold teaching mission. In its service courses, the mission of the Department is to assist in providing students across the university with critical thinking skills, writing skills, and a broad introduction to the humanities and their importance, as well as provide for a number of other majors advanced skills and knowledge in the humanities which those programs believe their graduates need. The degree mission of the department is to provide department graduates with the skills and knowledge for a variety of careers or for graduate or law school or other professional study through the development of close reading, writing, and critical thinking skills and through an in-depth study of a discipline.

In both its service and degree dimensions of its teaching mission, the Department seeks to enhance the student's role as citizen, not only through the enhancement of analytic and problem solving skills, but also through the development of aesthetic and moral awareness.

The research mission of the department not only helps to advance our understanding of the humanities, but also supports the teaching mission by ensuring a faculty that is up-to-date in its knowledge of the discipline.