My college is starting up an educational studies masters program this year–we’d love to have you apply!–and if you click the link, you’ll see a discussion of who would benefit from the program, how to combine an ed studies masters degree with doctoral programs, and post-graduate outcomes. The following is the transparent end sentence: “The concentration is recently approved, and we do not have post-graduate employment statistics yet.”
What is true is that there is data on post-graduate job data for this field of study in the state university system in general: of the 134 graduates of programs at sister institutions from 2006-07 through 2010-11, one year after graduation 75% of them were working in the state of Florida, 68% full-time, and the average salary was $50K and change.
If you are admitted to and join the 33-hour non-licensure educational studies masters program at USF, you will learn the following:
- Why there is now a website called “BeyondEducation” with this measure, along with some initial forays in similar ways at the University of Texas and other places.
- The limits of such data — both statistical and otherwise.
- The types of bureaucratic operations in schools (both K-12 and higher ed) that may lead that measure to be even more misleading than what you might guess without that knowledge.
- The major issues surrounding questions of equality of schooling from a social-science standpoint.
- A general grounding in the history of education.
My program colleagues are great teachers as well as fellow historians of education, and if you have questions about the problem, I am happy to answer them by email.