The purpose of graduate education is to provide for advanced and specialized training beyond the baccalaureate program. Graduate study is intended to strengthen the academic and professional competence of the student, to develop the student's capacity for independent study, to familiarize the student with past and current research, to train the student in the techniques of research, and to enable the student to relate his or her research to the investigations of other scholars and derive significant implications from the relationships. Graduate study presupposes a broad background of knowledge, an adequate preparation in a major and minor field of study at the baccalaureate level, and a command of skills required to carry on intensive research and investigation with a high degree of resourcefulness and self-direction. Generally speaking, only students with superior undergraduate academic records are qualified to pursue study at the graduate level. Greater emphasis is placed on productive research, with particular emphasis on the use of primary materials.
Less instruction is provided in content, survey-type lecture courses.
Graduate study thus involves far more than the passing of a given number of courses and the fulfillment of certain minimum requirements. The student cannot be content solely with earning acceptable grades. The student must continually satisfy the Graduate Faculty in the major field by displaying superior intellectual powers and scholarly commitment in order to maintain graduate status and good standing in the school. These graduate degrees and the fields of study are listed below. The Master of Arts in Curriculum and Instruction is a teaching degree.