Admission Requirements

Students seeking admission into the Master of Science in Education degree program in English Education must meet the admission requirements of Graduate Programs and the specific program requirements. In addition, applicants must have completed a minimum of 18 hours of professional education courses including the requirements for a valid teaching certificate based on a four-year teacher education program. Applicants who do not meet the requirements for a valid teaching certificate based on a four-year teacher education program will be required to complete the undergraduate courses required for such a certificate. These courses may be completed concurrently with the graduate work, but must be completed before the degree is awarded.

For unconditional admission, academic proficiency must be established through satisfaction of either of the following admission selection criteria:

1. A minimum cumulative undergraduate grade point average of 3.00 (or 3.25 on the last 60 hours) and a raw score of at least 30 on the Miller Analogies Test (MAT) or a minimum score of 292 on the combined verbal and quantitative sections of the Graduate Record Examination (GRE).
2. A minimum cumulative undergraduate grade point average of 2.75 (or 3.00 on the last 60 hours) and a raw score of at least 35 on the MAT or a minimum score of 292 on the combined verbal and quantitative sections of the GRE.

For conditional admission, academic proficiency must be established through satisfaction of either of the following admission selection criteria:

1. The total undergraduate GPA is 2.50 AND when the undergraduate GPA is multiplied by 10 and then multiplied by the MAT score the total is at least 600.
2. The total undergraduate GPA is 2.50 AND when the undergraduate GPA is multiplied by the GRE score the total is at least 1850.

Newly admitted students must take a preliminary examination immediately after completing six to nine hours of graduate course work. This preliminary examination is a proctored, impromptu written explication of a relatively brief poem or prose passage, the text of which will be presented to the student at the time of the examination. Students will have two hours in which to write this explication, which will be administered once each semester during the regular academic year and graded by a three-member committee. For information on the exam schedule, contact the graduate adviser.

Students failing the preliminary examination must retake it in the next consecutive full semester. Students who fail the explication a second time must complete a non-credit Independent Study in explication until they can pass an explication graded by three members of the English graduate faculty. Students may not take comprehensive exit exams for the degree until the explication requirement has been satisfied.

Graduate Courses and Credit

Graduate students enrolled in courses numbered 5000 through 5999 must do special work in addition to that required of undergraduates in the courses numbered 4000 through 4999. Courses numbered 6000 or above are open to fully qualified graduate students only.

Deficient Grades

Should a student receive more than 6 hours of “C” or lower in 5000- or 6000-level graduate degree credit courses, that student will not be allowed to continue in the program in subsequent semesters regardless of overall GPA.