Course summary

The MA Education programme is designed for education professionals who would like to further their knowledge and understanding of children and young people in society. You will be able to select from a wide range of modules in areas including special education needs, disability and inclusion and leadership and management in education, allowing you to shape the programme to your interests and career aspirations. Teaching takes place on weekday evenings to be accessible to those working full time. Schooling can be viewed as just one context within which education may take place; there are many other contexts in which educational approaches are used to work with children and young people. Some of these contexts include advisory work, early childhood practice, educational administration and policy, learning support and the third sector to enhance educational provision for children, families and communities. This MA will explore education across these different areas. The programme will draw on the wider professional experiences that students may have of working in contexts where educational approaches are important. These may include experiences such as employment in youth work, sports’ coaching with young people, working for charities with children and young people to provide learning opportunities in this country or internationally. This MA will cover critical social and educational theories and perspectives, as well as policy and practice relevant to global and local educational contexts. It will support you to achieve a critical awareness and understanding of education in its broadest sense as a process of human learning and development in and for human society. You will benefit greatly from engaging with the insights, experiences and perspectives of your peers who may come from a diverse range of contexts, backgrounds and experiences. These insights combined with your own experiences and the theory gained from the modules will allow you to deepen your understanding of working with children and young people and of education in its broadest sense. All lecturers leading modules on this programme have specialist qualifications, teaching or leadership experience in the field of education, with relevant research and scholarship backgrounds, which will help to shape the content of the programme. Those with less practical experience will need to have studied a degree programme such as BA Education, BA Children’s Studies, BA Youth Work, BA Early Childhood Studies, BA Social Pedagogy or BA Sports Coaching, all of which emphasise the practices of working with children and young people to enable their participation, development and learning.