This MA is designed for education professionals, or those interested in research, in teaching and learning or educational leadership – usually in schools, the lifelong learning sector and universities.

This Master’s degree engages you with key issues in education and aims to encourage your evidence-based practice, as you make direct and meaningful connections between the course and your own experiences and aspirations.

It broadens your knowledge of educational ideas and research findings, prompting you to identify and justify recommendations for further action. This places you in a better position to develop your work as a classroom practitioner or school leader.

Intermediate qualifications available:

• Postgraduate certificate – 60 credits at Master’s level
• Postgraduate diploma – 120 credits at Master’s level

Why choose this course?

• Its modular structure allows you to personalise your choice of units and progress at a pace that best suits you
• Explore the process of teaching, learning support and/or educational leadership, focusing on personal, academic and vocational interests relevant to your educational setting
• Benefit from an enrichment programme of guest speakers, visits and placement opportunities
• Progress your study in education, for example following your initial teacher education course
• Complete assessments based around your role in your educational organisation, with a final phase focused on educational research via a dissertation
• Support developments within the organisation where you work
• Undertake primary research that informs your current practice
• Acquire the necessary research skills to engage in future research
• Be prepared for further study at doctoral level (PhD and EdD)

The course includes an enrichment programme of guest speakers, visit and placement opportunities to help you to contextualise your studies and gain experience of a range of educational settings.

Unit Information - What will I learn?

• Citizenship And Welfare In The 21st Century (EDC116-6) Compulsory
• Dissertation In Education (EDC121-6) Compulsory
• Education And International Development (EDC123-6) Compulsory
• Research Methods In The Workplace (EDC129-6) Compulsory

How will I be assessed?

Each unit in this course has its own assessment. Wherever possible, the specific focus of assignments is negotiated individually between the unit co-ordinator and the student, within the parameters of the unit, in order to ensure that the assignment meets your personal and professional needs. The course provides students with a carefully planned and coherent sequence of learning opportunities that facilitate their development through formative and summative assessments. At this level the expectations, in terms of the quality of work produced, are high and students will need to take active control of their learning. At Master's level the expectation is that students are autonomous and confident learners, will undertake assessments that are challenging and require mature argument and sustained research, and fluent and cogent presentation. You are encouraged in their assessments to draw upon an extensive range of sources to demonstrate a deep theoretical understanding and the ability to apply that to current issues and contexts. The assessments test the ability to construct a reasoned, sustained and coherent argument, and to articulate it fluently. Students are required to demonstrate an appropriate level of research, of independent argument, and to reference in an appropriate way. Through the assessments designed for individual units, students practise and reinforce skills in researching, evaluating and synthesising materials with a critical eye; quantitative and qualitative data collection and handling, together with skills associated with conventional academic tasks. Unit assessment is based on specified learning outcomes and threshold criteria. The unit information forms state clearly the aims, objectives and learning outcomes of the unit, and delineate the criteria of assessment for each outcome. The unit assessment feedback offers detailed comment to the student on the assessment piece. The taught stage of the course (stage 1) requires you to pass 120 credits before progressing to stage 2, the 60 credit dissertation.

Why study in the School of Education and English?

• Broad spectrum of opportunities to study language and linguistics
• 92% satisfaction with English Language and TEFL, NSS 2020

Course Leader - Dr Cathal Butler

*Scholarships available for international students.