What is a Master’s Degree?

Hav­ing an under­grad­u­ate degree was once con­sid­ered a neces­si­ty for indi­vid­u­als who want­ed to apply for great job oppor­tu­ni­ties, includ­ing entry-lev­el posi­tions. Thanks to advances in com­mu­ni­ca­tions and tech­nol­o­gy, many employ­ers elect to hire indi­vid­u­als with a master’s degree. Com­ple­tion of a grad­u­ate pro­gram shows employ­ers that mas­ter’s degree hold­ers have the abil­i­ty to uti­lize the more sophis­ti­cat­ed skills and edu­ca­tion­al back­ground only a mas­ter’s degree can pro­vide. Grad­u­ates with mas­ter’s degrees are often viewed as poten­tial employ­ees who have exper­tise in a spe­cif­ic field, which comes in handy when an employ­ee is required to think crit­i­cal­ly, or com­plete mid-lev­el projects that are complex.

Types of Master’s Degree Programs

There are var­i­ous types of mas­ter degree pro­grams that you could enroll in, such as Mas­ter of Pub­lic Health, Mas­ter of Social Work, Mas­ter of Fine Arts, Mas­ter of Library Ser­vices, Mas­ter of Busi­ness Admin­is­tra­tion, and more. Depend­ing on what col­lege or uni­ver­si­ty you are enrolling in, some will have indi­vid­ual dis­ci­plines – such as Mas­ter of Chem­istry; how­ev­er, this degree will typ­i­cal­ly be referred to as a Mas­ter of Science.

How Long Does the Master’s Degree Program Last?

The answer to this ques­tion will vary; some stu­dents can suc­cess­ful­ly com­plete their master’s degree pro­grams in one year, while oth­er stu­dents may need up to six years to fin­ish their pro­gram. Your sched­ule gen­er­al­ly deter­mines when you will com­plete your pro­gram. If you are work­ing full or part-time, you will need to work around your sched­ule. This could cause you to take class­es on a part-time basis; if this is the case, you will need to sched­ule cours­es when they are avail­able, and only if you have the time to com­mit to those cours­es. Each master’s degree pro­gram will vary, but you will typ­i­cal­ly need to take between 36 and 54 semes­ter cred­it hours of study before your pro­gram is complete.

You are encour­aged to take your time when enrolled in a master’s degree pro­gram. You want to make sure you get the best edu­ca­tion pos­si­ble, so make sure you find a school and degree pro­gram that can accom­mo­date your sched­ule. Some edu­ca­tion­al uni­ver­si­ties offer online master’s degree pro­grams; this gives you more flexibility.

Why Pursue a Master’s Degree?

When you receive an asso­ciate degree, you will have a two-year under­grad­u­ate degree from an accred­it­ed uni­ver­si­ty, col­lege, or voca­tion­al school. The gen­er­al edu­ca­tion require­ments are what you will typ­i­cal­ly study while enrolled in an asso­ciate degree pro­gram. These col­lege cred­its will be used when you apply for a bachelor’s degree program.

When you enroll in a bachelor’s degree pro­gram, you will typ­i­cal­ly spend four years com­plet­ing your degree pro­gram; two years if you have already com­plet­ed an asso­ciate degree pro­gram. In com­par­i­son to an associate’s degree pro­gram, you can find a bachelor’s pro­gram in almost every career field that there is, rang­ing from fash­ion design to lan­guages. How­ev­er, when you want to advance your edu­ca­tion, you will need to enroll in a master’s degree program.

In order to enroll in a master’s degree pro­gram, the edu­ca­tion­al insti­tu­tion you are apply­ing to will require that you have suc­cess­ful­ly com­plet­ed a bachelor’s degree pro­gram first. It is a fact that the more edu­ca­tion you have, the more like­ly you are to find bet­ter job oppor­tu­ni­ties. For exam­ple; the job oppor­tu­ni­ties for some­one with a Master’s Degree in Busi­ness Admin­is­tra­tion (MBA) are often bet­ter than some­one who has a Bachelor’s Degree in Busi­ness Admin­is­tra­tion. The demand for an MBA stu­dent is much high­er, and there are more glob­al oppor­tu­ni­ties as well.

When you receive a master’s degree, you become more mar­ketable, espe­cial­ly in these tough eco­nom­i­cal times. Employ­ers see an appli­cant with a master’s degree as more qual­i­fied for the posi­tion because you have tak­en the time to fur­ther your edu­ca­tion. Some employ­ers feel that an appli­cant with a master’s degree is more ded­i­cat­ed and that they are bet­ter qual­i­fied than some­one with less edu­ca­tion – com­pared to an indi­vid­ual that has an asso­ciate or bach­e­lor degree.

A master’s degree is the first lev­el of grad­u­ate study. A grad­u­ate degree could guar­an­tee you a high­er salary when com­pared to some­one with an asso­ciate or bachelor’s degree. Some employ­ers require that you have a master’s degree for the posi­tion, espe­cial­ly in high­er-lev­el posi­tions with­in a cor­po­ra­tion or orga­ni­za­tion. Many stu­dents who have their master’s degree start their own busi­ness­es; earn­ing a master’s degree in your career field gives you the knowl­edge and tools that you need to start your own busi­ness, and become a suc­cess­ful entrepreneur.

Obtain­ing your master’s degree could be dif­fi­cult to do, but the out­come makes the endeav­or well worth the chal­lenge. You will learn more, mak­ing you an expert in your career field, which could lead to more career oppor­tu­ni­ties, pro­mo­tions, and high­er salaries. A master’s degree is some­times the dif­fer­ence between a low­er-lev­el posi­tion and a man­age­r­i­al posi­tion. You could be hired for the lat­ter with a master’s degree. Advanc­ing your edu­ca­tion with­in a mas­ter’s lev­el field of study may not only expand your edu­ca­tion­al foun­da­tion but will also expand your career potential.

Relat­ed:

Where Can I Find The Best Accred­it­ed Mas­ters Degree In Education?

Is a Mas­ter’s in Mechan­i­cal Engi­neer­ing Bet­ter Than a Bachelor’s?