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Master’s of Education

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Program Overview

Reach the next level and expand your horizon with a Master of Arts in Education. Designed for adult learners with either a bachelor’s degree or background in education, this fully accredited, affordable graduate degree is offered 100% online. Advance your career and skill set while maintaining balance in other areas of your life.

This master’s program is intended primarily for professional educators, including teachers, administrators, counselors, coaches, instructional coordinators, and leaders in educational policy. Students will study concepts, strategies, and best practices as they consider application techniques in their fields. In addition, York College offers several degree concentrations to receive coursework more specific to your particular area.

If you have questions about this Education Master's or would like to schedule an informational meeting, please contact our team at online@york.edu.

Curriculum and Instruction (Area of Concentration)

The primary objective of the Curriculum and Instruction program is to provide innovative training for educators responsible for developing and mapping curriculum, while becoming a more effective teacher through training in instructional strategies and best practices. Through an understanding of current issues in education and implementing technological learning tools within the classroom, educators will be equipped to be effective instructional leaders that can impact the learning of their students positively.

Educational Leadership (Area of Concentration)

Schools need excellent leaders, not only in the principalship but also in the classroom. This concentration is aligned with the NELP standards and has two pathways. The first is a non-licensure area of concentration in the Master of Arts in Education degree. While this pathway does not lead to state certification, it will provide an excellent study in areas school leaders must have in their toolbox: supervision, finance, and building teams. This route will be an excellent choice for any candidate not needing an admnistrative endosment on a state license., but very interested in developing skills as a leader in an educational organization.

The second pathway leads to a building-level principal endorsement that will prepare candidates as a principal in Pre-K through 8th grade, 7th – 12th grade, or PreK-12 grade. This pathway meets the requirements for currently licensed teachers who aspire to be building principals, assistant principals, athletic directors, early childhood directors, or other leaders who will be evaluating and hiring school personnel. This route embeds the internship experience throughout the program, cumulates with a Capstone course, and is approved by the Nebraska Department of Education. Click here for more information specific to this pathway.

Social and Emotional Leadership (Area of Concentration)

One of the highest areas of need in society today is in the space of social and emotional awareness and leadership. Many schools and organizations are in high demand for qualified people to work with students, or employees, in areas of guidance and counseling. This concentration will provide educational or organizational leaders with strategies for effectively helping others manage emotions, set and achieve positive goals, show empathy for others, make positive decisions, or make responsible choices. Within the concentration, a student will study crisis intervention, organizational and human behavior, and social emotional intelligence.

Sports Administration (Area of Concentration)

Set yourself apart by being prepared to bring innovative and team leadership to sports-related enterprises. This concentration can equip you to meet the business, administration, coaching, and experiential challenges that come with building and maintaining a successful sports program and career. You will graduate with the knowledge, disciplines, and insights needed to navigate the sports industry. Graduates become leaders in a $900 billion global industry exploding with opportunities through mobile technology, interactive spectatorship, fantasy sports, and performance analytics opening the door for a new generation of sports professionals who are prepared to step in.

Program Goals

Our goals/outcomes for graduates of the Master of Arts in Education degree program:

The graduate candidate will apply ethical principles to appropriate subject matter in professional settings.
The graduate candidate will evaluate multiple approaches in organizational programs, policy, practice, and planning in a professional context.
The graduate candidate will differentiate appropriate ways to effectively interact and communicate in a professional context.
The graduate candidate will apply best practices in their teaching and curriculum in a K12 educational setting regarding effective learning strategies and assessment.
The graduate candidate will use best practices to design, collect, and evaluate an action research project, set within the context of their educational setting.
The graduate candidate will analyze and design curriculum aligned to student learning outcomes within the context of their educational setting.

Courses

The Mater of Arts in Education is a 36-credit hour program consisting of 12 courses. Active students may transfer up to 6 qualified credit hours toward the degree.

Core Curriculum

9 hours - each course is 3 hours

Research Design & Methodology

This course will provide an opportunity for participants to establish or advance their understanding of research through critical exploration of research language, ethics, and approaches. The course introduces the language of research, ethical principles and challenges, and the elements of the research process within quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods approaches. Participants will use these theoretical underpinnings to begin to critically review literature relevant to their field or interests and determine how research findings are useful in informing their understanding of their environment (work, social, local, global).

Program Planning & Evaluation

Program Planning presents an overview of the process for designing, presenting and evaluating programs in a variety of fields. This course provides instruction and practice in designing and implementing high quality programs. This essential skills learning is for York College Online professionals to build skills in the areas of program development, evaluation, and impact reporting. The course includes training on active learning, practical application, and practice in developing evaluation tools to measure program impact.

Navigating in a Diverse Society

This course provides students with the awareness, knowledge and skills required of professional leaders, supervisors, managers, counselors, and educators if they are to be effective in a pluralistic and diverse society. This course prepares students to be multi-culturally competent. Diversity and identity issues, multicultural models and frameworks will be explored in relation to their impact on therapeutic, instructional, and supervisory relationships.

Major Curriculum

18 hours - each course is 3 hours

The School as an Organization

The purpose of this course is to provide knowledge of organization and administrative functions within a K-12 educational setting. Specific topics include, but are not limited to, the following areas: organizational structures, school culture, bringing about change in schools, collaboration, school improvement planning, personnel, student support services, special education, school support programs and agencies, instructional support, curriculum development and professional development. The theories and principles held by a variety of authors in the area of school leadership will be explored, through the reading and presenting a review of a book on school leadership by each class member. Professional learning communities of class members will gain experience in working as a collaborative team in developing a school improvement plan to turn around a dysfunctional school.

Teachers and the Law

This course will provide an in-depth student of school law that focuses on historical court cases, current issues, and the ever-changing legal ramifications of working in an educational setting.

Learning Through Technology

This course explores blended learning from perspectives of theory and practice and is designed for leaders, educators, and instructional designers in all educational environments. It focuses on the application of theory and research to pedagogy and curriculum design to achieve a synergy between synchronous and asynchronous environments. Topics include theoretical frameworks and best practices in blended learning, institutional perspectives and assessment, and the design and implementation of a blended curriculum.

Current Issues in Instruction/Education

Students will explore and examine current issues in Instruction including the politics, public opinion and practical application of instruction and learning in a school or learning environment. Educators and trainers must be knowledgeable regarding implications of state and federal legislation regarding delivery systems, funding, high stakes testing and how curriculum and instruction is affected by external forces. This course also surveys historical and current trends in educational curriculum development and their impact on public and non-public schools from an instructional leadership perspective.

Assessment of Learning

In this course, students will study assessment literacy and design and develop assessments to be integrated into the learning process. Prior assessment, formative assessment, summative assessment, portfolio assessment, and performance-based assessment will be studied. Students will understand how clearly developed learning outcomes will inform the process of curriculum evaluation and revision. Effective testing and evaluation linked to course outcomes and grading policies will also be discussed.

Elective (Required)

Any master's-level course can satisfy the requirement for an elective.

Areas of Concentration:

9 hours - all from one area

Curriculum & Instruction

Effective Strategies of Instruction

Curriculum Mapping

In this course, students will understand how to incorporate mapping in classrooms to enrich curricula and to impact student performance. The goal of curriculum mapping is to match the learning outcomes in a single curriculum to the overall learning outcomes for the entire program. State and National Standards will be used to map curricula to students’ school or district goals.

Curriculum Development & Design

This course will introduce the principles of curriculum and instruction with an emphasis on curriculum development and design, implementation and delivery, and organization and evaluation. Students will examine theory, issues, problems, organization, and application of instructional design for teachers in planning and developing a curriculum. The course also presents examples of effective strategies including concept-based curricula, backward design, interdisciplinary approaches, integrated curricula (curriculum mapping), assessment, and reporting techniques.

Educational Leadership

(non-certification)

School Supervision

This course will examine the role of the school leader and the various roles/principles of supervision as they pertain to instructional leadership, school policy, and human resources. Content will discuss the fundamentals of recruiting and hiring quality staff. Students will learn the typical roles of principals, superintendents, and other educational supervisors. Other topics are leadership styles, student outcomes, and school operations.

School Finance

This course exposes students to insight regarding the cost of operations for K-12 schools. Topics will review the laws and regulations that oversee financial reporting at the local, state, and federal levels. Students will also examine the fundamental information of accounting principles, resource allocations, fiscal responsibilities, daily operations costs and administrative processes as they pertain to the fiscal responsibilities of school leaders.

Building & Managing Educational Teams

School leaders are called upon to work collaboratively with faculty and staff in order to accomplish much of the work that is required of them. Building and managing effective teams in a school setting is an important way to accomplish the tasks of school leaders and instructors. Professional Learning Communities tenets will be examined to understand how teams can be effective in school improvement. Other topics include high-performing teams, developing team skills, resolving conflict and virtual teams.

Social & Emotional Learning

Counseling Skills & Crisis Intervention

This course is designed to prepare individuals to navigate concerns of crisis making an impact on our youth and society. Practical applications that serve a diverse population will be studied and applied using theoretical approaches and techniques. Preparation for crisis strategies, social and emotional growth, trauma and recovery will be explored.

Critical Issues in Social & Emotional Learning

This course examines issues related to social emotional learning and leadership development. It will explore contributing factors and how caring professionals can help people overcome problems and build resilience that affect their motivation to learn as well as their interpersonal skills.

Organizational Leadership & Human Behavior

This course examines the complex nature of human behavior that takes place within organizations. These behaviors, both individual and group, have an effect on the stated outcomes of organizations. Leaders who understand these behaviors are better equipped to lead. Included in the course are identification of current leaders and leadership as well as contemporary perspectives on ethics, networking, coaching, organizational culture, diversity, learning organizations, strategic leadership, and crisis leadership with a focus on foundational Leadership Theory.

Sports Administration

Facility and Game Day Operations

This course will examine a panoramic view of game day operations and facilities management. Strategic objectives regarding facility management, renovation, planning and building will be explored. Business models exploring how to create game day branded experiences, luxuries, and memories to entice continued attraction will be introduced.

Sports Economics and Finances

This course explores internal and external implications, which influence the economics associated with athletics. Additionally the course will focus on and examine business choices such as cash flow and financial planning as it relates to leading and administering within an athletic environment at the administrative, coaching, team, and associated school or franchise level. By the end of this course, learners will be able to apply real world finance in a sport administration role.

Administrative Strategies in Athletics

This course will explore leadership theory and themes applied to athletic leaders, managers, coaches, players, and staff. An emphasis will be placed on current events, opportunities, and challenges facing athletic programs and franchises.

More courses can be found in the course catalog >>

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The mission of York College is to transform lives through Christ-centered education and to equip students for lifelong service to God, family and society.