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Master of Education - Higher Education
Program Overview
The Master’s of Education in Higher Education is designed to prepare students for success in entry- and mid-career level professional positions within a variety of postsecondary education contexts. The program emphasizes the integration of theoretical foundations, principles of practice, and reflective professional experiences.
Students admitted into the Higher Education master’s program may focus in Higher Education Administration, Student Affairs Practice in Higher Education, or Intercollegiate Athletic Administration. Although coursework in the three areas may vary according to student’s individual plan the objectives remain consistent throughout the program:
- Theoretical Foundation: An integration and application of the theoretical foundations of higher education; this may include economic, political,sociology, psychology, leadership, and organizational theory.
- Principles of Practice: Coursework that develops and refines core competencies for student affairs, general administration, and athletic administration work in colleges and universities and other postsecondary settings.
- Reflective Professional Experience: Professional student affairs,genera ladministration, and athletic internships that lead to successful work in the specialized functiona lareas of higher education; the experience includes development of a professional philosophy and career plan,an introduction to major professional and service organizations.
Total Number of Credits Required
The M.Ed. in Higher Education requires the completion of 36 credit hours including 21 required core course credits.
EDLF 8649 Introduction to Higher Education (3 credits)
EDLF 8652 College Student Experience (3 credits)
EDLF 8654 Organization and Governance in Higher Education (3 credits)
EDLF 8655 Politics of Difference (3 credits)
EDLF 7610 Research in Higher Education, Student Affairs, & Athletic Administration (3 credits)
EDLF 8985 Internship * (3 credits)
EDLF 8991 Capstone (3 credits)
The remaining 15 hours of coursework are made up of elective courses in the student’s area of focus.
Culminating Experience for the Master’s Degree
The Capstone for the M.Ed. is a cumulative experience that integrates prior theory and content into practice within a simulated university context.
Other specific program requirements
All full-time students in the program are required to complete an administrative internship.
* Part-time students may substitute another 3 credit elective for EDLF 8985 Internship upon consultation with the program advisor.
Doctor of Eduation - Higher Education
Program Overview
All Ed.D. programs in the Curry School are designed to prepare scholar/practitioners to assume leadership or supervisory roles in their educational fields, or work as faculty members in higher education institutions. The primary purpose of the Ed.D. in Higher Education is to provide experienced and practicing educators with a broad and systematic understanding of higher education, a definitive knowledge of selected aspects of educational theory and practice, and an ability to apply research in an informed and critical manner to educational practice and problems.
Ed.D. students in Higher Education complete a program of study totaling 72 credits consisting of a minimum of 57 hours of coursework, including a required higher education core (21 credits), a minor in research methods (15 credits), a content minor organized around a theme or set of questions of the student’s choice (12 credits), and elective courses in higher education (9 credits). Students will choose their content minor with the advice and consent of their advisors. Courses for the content minor may be taken outside of the program and the Curry School. Typical content minor areas include student affairs, higher education policy, the organization and governance of higher education, the economics of higher education, and the social foundations of higher education.
Students entering the doctoral program with a master’s degree can apply up to 24 hours of credit to their doctoral program, provided that the program area faculty judges that the courses are sufficiently comparable to substitute for courses offered in the doctoral program. Students may earn 12 internship credits, most likely distributed across 4 semesters in which students earn 3 credits during each semester. Paid employment in a school or other practice setting, or other arrangements may be substituted for an on-Grounds internship, provided that the student receives supervision and training throughout this experience.
While Ed.D. students may study on a part-time basis, high-level professional training and intellectual development require a concentrated experience that is possible only through sustained involvement in the academic and other activities of the Higher Education program and University. Participation in Higher Education program research and service projects, informal work with individual faculty members, and sustained interaction with other students all add substantially to the coursework. In short, to round out an advanced degree program, a student is expected to participate in and contribute to a rich academic community.
Required Courses
Core Courses (21 credits)
EDLF 8649 Introduction to Higher Education (3 credits)
EDLF 8651 History of Higher Education (3 credits)
EDLF 8652 College Student Experience (3 credits)
EDLF 8654 Organization and Governance in Higher Education (3 credits)
EDLF 8655 Politics of Difference (3 credits)
EDLF 8662 Politics and Education (3 credits) AND
EDLF 8657 Economics and Finance of Higher Education (3 credits) OR
EDLF 8680 Economics and Education Policy (3 credits)
Higher Education Electives (a minimum of 9 credits required)
EDLF 8648 College Student Development (3 credits)
EDLF 8653 Curriculum in Higher Education (3 credits)
EDLF 8647 Student Affairs in Colleges and Universities (3 credits)
EDLF 8658 Management and Planning in Higher Education (3 credits)
EDLF 8664 The Community College (3 credits)
EDLF 8665 Contemporary Issues: Entrepreneurship in Higher Education (3 credits)
EDLF 8663 The American Professoriate (3 credits)
EDLF 8680 Economics and Education Policy (if not taken for the core requirement) (3 credits)
Research Minor (minimum of 15 credits)
EDLF 5330 Descriptive and Inferential Statistics (Stat I) (3 credits)
EDLF 7420 Experimental Design: Stat II (3 credits)
EDLF 7404 Qualitative Analysis (3 credits)
EDLF 9810 Research Seminar in Higher Education (3 credits) (This course is designed to prepare doctoral students to write their capstone proposals and may be taken only by individuals who have finished the research sequence and have no more than six credits to complete.)
AND
One research elective (3 credits)
Content Minor (a minimum of 12 credits)
Students may take their content minor courses outside the program and the Curry School, or they may choose courses from other Curry programs. The minor is meant to supply the student with substantive knowledge of and a theoretical grounding in an area that might be the topic of the dissertation. Courses to be taken for minor credit must be negotiated with and approved by the student’s advisor.
Capstone (12 credits minimum required)
EDLF 9991 Ed.D. Research (may be repeated for credit)
Qualifying Examination
Beginning with the 2017/18 academic year, all Ed.D. students will be required to pass a written qualifying examination prepared by the Higher Education faculty. The qualifying exam will test students’ knowledge in a range of topics and will serve as a prerequisite for continuation to the Ed.D. capstone research.
Culminating Experience for the Ed.D. degree Ed.D. Capstone
The purpose of the capstone project is to provide prospective practitioner-scholars with a supervised opportunity to demonstrate the knowledge, skills, and understandings that they have acquired in their Ed.D. course of study. In order to demonstrate what they have learned, Ed.D. students are expected to identify a problem of importance to practitioners and apply what they have learned in order to address the problem. Use-inspired disciplined inquiry for improved practice is the ultimate aim of the Ed.D. capstone project. The format of the written work should reflect the fact that a capstone project is intended to benefit practitioners and, ultimately, the public.
Capstone projects should aim to improve practice by solving a problem and contributing to improved organizational or professional performance. As a problem-solving study it inquires into and analyzes the nature and dimensions of a problem and establishes that there is a difference between the present and the ideal state, and then builds a case for improvements and makes recommendations for action. It is pragmatic in nature, not theoretical, and seeks to make a case for recommended action. Overall, a capstone project addresses the questions of what is the problem, and what should we do about it? One or more guiding questions for inquiry will in turn flow from these.
While the capstone project should demonstrate mastery of key theoretical frameworks, content areas, and practices in higher education, it may draw upon qualitative and/or quantitative research techniques and may take a number of forms, which include (but are not limited to) needs analysis, program evaluation or process analysis, program development and design, organizational diagnosis, organizational development, policy analysis, impact evaluation and cost-benefit analysis. The capstone project must be approved by the student’s mentor and the program director.
Doctor of Philosophy - Higher Education
Program Overview
The primary purpose of the Ph.D. degree in Higher Education is to develop scholars who are able to conduct original research and interpret and communicate the results of such research through writing, teaching, practice, and other means. Program graduates typically pursue faculty careers or become senior administrators in colleges and universities.
Total Number of Credits Required
Ph.D. students in Higher Education complete a program of study that includes at least 60 hours of coursework (excluding dissertation credit). Acceptance of up to 24 hours of transfer credit from a student’s master’s degree program or from post-master’s work completed at another institution is determined on an individual basis by the student’s advisor and the program coordinator. The program coordinator may exempt students from required courses that they have already taken.
In addition to a required set of core courses in higher education (21 credits) and a minor in research methods (18 credits), the Ph.D. student is also required to complete elective coursework in higher education (9 credits). A content minor (12 credits), chosen with the advice and consent of the student’s advisor and organized around a theme or set of questions, is also required for the Ph.D. Courses for the content minor may be taken outside of the program and the Curry School.
Ph.D. students are required to complete ten hours of mentored research or teaching assistance per week each semester they are enrolled. Internship placements (paid, ten to twenty hours per week) can be arranged within the University of Virginia and at cooperating colleges and universities, other postsecondary agencies, or institutes.
List of Required Core Courses
EDLF 8649 Introduction to Higher Education - (3 Credits)
EDLF 8651 History of Higher Education- (3 Credits)
EDLF 8652 College Student Experience- (3 Credits)
EDLF 8654 Organization and Governance in Higher Education - (3 Credits)
EDLF 8655 Politics of Difference - (3 Credits)
EDLF 8662 Education and Politics -(3 Credits)
EDLF 8657 Economics and Finance of Higher Education-(3 Credits)
or
EDLF 8680 Economics and Education Policy - (3 Credits)
Higher Education Electives (a minimum of 9 credits required)
EDLF 8648 College Student Development - (3 Credits)
EDLF 8653 Curriculum in Higher Education - (3 Credits)
EDLF 8647 Student Affairs in Colleges and Universities - (3 Credits)
EDLF 8657 Economics and Finance of Higher Education (if not taken for the core requirement) - (3 Credits)
EDLF 8658 Management and Planning in Higher Education -(3 Credits)
EDLF 8664 The Community College - (3 Credits)
EDLF 8665 Contemporary Issues: Entrepreneurship in Higher Education - (3 Credits)
EDLF 8663 The American Professoriate -(3 Credits)
Research Minor (minimum of 18 credits)
EDLF 7300 - Foundations of Educational Research (3 Credits)
EDLF 5330 - Descriptive and Inferential Statistics Stat I - (3 Credits)
EDLF 7420 Experimental Design: Stat II - (3 Credits)
EDLF 7404 Qualitative Analysis - (3 Credits)
AND
Two research electives (including EDLF 9810 Research Seminar in Higher Education 3 credits)
Content Minor (a minimum of 12 credits)
Students may take their content minor courses outside the program and the Curry School, or they may choose courses from other Curry programs. The minor is meant to supply the student with substantive knowledge of and a theoretical grounding in an area that might be the topic of the dissertation. Courses to be taken for minor credit must be approved by the student’s advisor.
Dissertation (12 credits minimum required)
EDLF 9999 Doctoral Dissertation
Qualifying Exercises: Policies and Procedures
Students seeking the Ph.D. must register for EDLF 9810 Research Seminar in Higher Education Research, in their final semester of coursework (a course that is taken pass/fail). Students with one or two courses left to take in the fall may register for this course and write the qualifying paper only with the consent of both their mentor and the instructor of the research seminar. In this course, they develop the tools to write a qualifying paper.
Like a dissertation proposal, the paper should pose a question and say why it is important. This question may or may not be the same as the one the student is planning to pursue in the dissertation. The paper should then describe where the question fits into the relevant scholarly literature, what theoretical or conceptual paradigm anchors the research, and the contribution it will make to that literature, as well as articulate the challenges to the researcher in addressing it. Unlike a dissertation proposal methods section, the last part of the paper should describe the full range of strategies for answering the question and the advantages and disadvantages of each.
Culminating Experience for the Ph.D.
Once the qualifying paper has been approved by the faculty, students move to the development and defense of a dissertation proposal. In this phase, the candidate works with his or her dissertation advisor until the advisor considers the dissertation proposal sufficiently developed to be presented to the other members of the committee. The proposal, approved by the dissertation chair, must be distributed to committee members and to the admissions office at least 14 days prior to the defense. A list of committee members, the location and time of the defense, and an abstract of the proposal must accompany the submission to the admissions office, which will make a general announcement that the defense is scheduled to take place. The defense is open to all faculty and students. At this meeting, the candidate formally presents the proposal (equivalent to a presentation at a scholarly conference), and committee members make suggestions and ask questions about it. Once the doctoral committee members have unanimously approved the proposal, they sign the student’s record of progress.
Doctoral candidates who are writing their dissertations should consult the Curry School’s Guidelines for Doctoral Dissertations, available on the Curry Website. Students enroll for EDLF 9999 Doctoral Dissertation Research with their dissertation advisors each semester throughout the writing phase for the number of credit hours specified by the advisors, but for at least 12 hours in total.
