MA Education (on campus)

Semester 1

Week beginning 22 September 2025

• Tuesdays: 10am to 12pm 
• Wednesdays: 10am to 12pm with some 1pm to 3pm or 4.30pm to 7pm sessions

Your four taught modules run Tuesdays and Wednesdays throughout semesters one and two. 

Semester three will involve some taught dissertation sessions, workshops and supervisions.

There are also twilight research and writing workshop sessions each semester, typically on Wednesdays and Thursdays, and an annual conference.

Full details of your individual academic timetable, including Semester 2 timetable which may differ, will be available via your university email calendar after you have completed online enrolment and set up your student login.

A Masters course is a progression from undergraduate study and requires a higher level of independent study, persistent curiosity, criticality, reflection and layered analysis and synthesis. With this in mind, in preparation for your Masters study please ready yourself by:

• Engaging with and thinking about contemporary educational issues and concerns in the press, in educational publications, across media.
• Reading widely around the interests you have in education, using Open Access research articles, perhaps through Google Scholar.
• Reading about research methods and Postgraduate study. You may have existing access to university libraries or use Open access sources on the internet.
• Semester one modules will require your attunement to contemporary concerns in education globally and to the kinds of evidence-based and theoretically argued educational practices that are being developed and tested globally.

All students

Your first day on campus is induction day on:

• Wednesday 17 September 2025
• 9:30am to 12pm and 1pm to 4pm
• Room DA020

Please come to the main reception for directions to room DA020, which is downstairs in Darwin block.

The programme for the day will enable you to: meet and get to know your fellow students and staff; ensure you are registered so that you can access Library and Moodle resources; find out more about how the MA Education on-campus will run; familiarise you with the university if you are new to it and also access pre-session reading and tasks for Week 1. You will receive an email with a timetable for the day early in September.

Home students

Please bring your photo ID with you on Wednesday 17 September to complete the ID verification check for Student Finance confirmation.

International students

International students will attend additional international student induction events starting:

• Tuesday 16 September 2025
• 2pm to 5pm
• Room DA006

International students will be required to enrol in-person as part of the event on Tuesday 16 September. Please check back for further information about enrolment and induction for international students.

You will have different module tutors across the year, and opportunity to engage with and learn from the wider Education and Childhood and Professional Studies team. You will be working immediately with:

• Dr Jo Trowsdale
• Dr Linda Enow
• Miranda Barker
• Andrew Edgar

You may also work with others in the team (Dr Steve Dixon, Dr Ben Johnson, Dr Jane Beniston, Dr Sarah Parkes, Kate Dudley) and across the school of education as dissertation supervisor and will certainly meet and have opportunities to hear about their specialisms and those of fellow research students through twilight research sharing sessions and workshops.

Teaching is enquiry-based and collaborative. Your interests will be central to the assignment foci you choose.

Modules will provide opportunity for you to identify and generate connections between theory and practice in relation to your foci.

You will be facilitated to learn from and with peers, to investigate and explore both together and independently.

You will study five modules in total (4 x 30 credit / 300 hours study; 1 x 60 credit / 600 hours study):
Semester 1:

• EPM725 Critiquing Education will explore how the lenses of philosophy, psychology and sociology of education can illuminate and deepen our own criticality in examining contemporary and critical issues of concern in education. You will consider how they can generate distinct and complementary lenses for thinking critically about contemporary, historical and global issues of collective and personal interest, deepening your skills in critical analysis.
• EPM721 Pedagogy and Practice will engage you in a critical exploration of how learning happens and an investigation of the character and claims for diverse educational practices and pedagogies. Through a focus on the interrelated areas of learning, teaching and assessment you will engage with key theories and debates, analysing and reflecting on their relevance to your personal and professional interests.
  Semester 2
• EPM722 Inclusive Practices will enable you to critically engage with the concept of inclusion with a focus on special educational needs and disability. You will develop a critical understanding of how structural and socio-culturally situated inequalities can affect young people’s access, participation and success in education and society and how different needs, such as SEND can affect pupils’ participation and learning. You will explore strategies to promote inclusive and supportive communities through evidence-based practices.
• EPM730 Research Design: Methods and Methodology will enable you to develop a critical understanding of the principles underpinning an effective research design in education at master’s level. You will explore issues of research methodology, ethics and understanding in relation to your chosen field, to enhance and inform professional and/or academic practice. You will design a research project, which will include a framework for the collection and analysis/interpretation of primary data.
  Semester 3
• EPM705 Research Project / Dissertation (double weighted) provides you with the support and opportunity to undertake and write-up your own research study.