Master of Arts in Teaching

The Master of Arts in Teaching (MAT) or Master of Science in Teaching (MST) degree is generally a pre-service degree that usually requires a minimum of 30 semester hours beyond the Bachelor's degree. While the program often requires education classes in order to meet state licensure requirements, it emphasizes advanced course work in a specific academic discipline to enhance one's knowledge in that subject area. Furthermore, it focuses on educating the candidate in practical teaching skills for use as a teacher, as opposed to focusing on performing research in the educational field. Candidates usually spend a semester as a student teacher in order to earn the degree. There are two general models that (MAT) degrees follow: a 5th year model in which students spend one year extra beyond their bachelor’s degree to earn a masters degree and an initial teaching license; and a Flex program which usually offers part-time weekend and evening courses to accommodate professionals who are changing careers. The Master’s of Arts in Teaching degree is often advantageous to middle school and secondary school teachers because it allows them to focus on subject area knowledge in their undergraduate program and then acquire pedagogical skills in their graduate studies. It differs from the Masters in Education (MEd) degree which is usually geared toward practicing teachers, or toward those who desire to serve as counselors (school or otherwise) or as educational administrators.

Academic degrees
First-tier
  • Associate degree
  • Foundation degree
Second-tier
  • Bachelor's degree
Third-tier
  • DEA
  • Diplom
  • Engineer's degree
  • Magister
  • Master's degree
Fourth-tier
  • Doctoral degree
  • Terminal degree
Other
  • Honorary degree
  • Licentiate
  • Professional doctorate
  • Professorial degree
  • Professional degree
  • Specialist degree


Famous quotes containing the words master of, master, arts and/or teaching:

    A master of men was the Goodly Fere,
    A mate of the wind and sea,
    If they think they ha’ slain our Goodly Fere
    They are fools eternally.

    I ha’ seen him eat o’ the honey-comb
    Sin’ they nailed him to the tree.
    Ezra Pound (1885–1972)

    It is, all in all, a historic error to believe that the master makes the school; the students make it!
    Robert Musil (1880–1942)

    What ails it, intrinsically, is a dearth of intellectual audacity and of aesthetic passion. Running through it, and characterizing the work of almost every man and woman producing it, there is an unescapable suggestion of the old Puritan suspicion of the fine arts as such—of the doctrine that they offer fit asylum for good citizens only when some ulterior and superior purpose is carried into them.
    —H.L. (Henry Lewis)

    This teaching is not practical in the sense in which the New Testament is. It is not always sound sense in practice. The Brahman never proposes courageously to assault evil, but patiently to starve it out. His active faculties are paralyzed by the idea of caste, of impassable limits of destiny and the tyranny of time.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)