Title: Urban Education, Learning and Design Masters to Begin in 2017

Two new master’s programs – one designed to give students tools to transform K-12 urban education and the other to provide key concepts in design, innovation,technology and analytics – will begin in the summerof 2017.

The Master of Arts in Educational Transformationfocuses on giving K-12 urban educators the skills and insights to tackle tough problems and promote opportunity and justice for children in underserved communities.

The first year of the program, which begins in July of 2017 and ends in June of 2018, places students in a field-based setting, working through real problems and real tasks.

“This program really fuses three Georgetown traditions – our concern with educating the whole person, our expertise in policy work and our deep commitment to social justice,” says Douglas Reed, associate professor of government. “We want future teachers and policymakers to be transformative instructional leaders and advocates for children.”

“That means making sure they have an interdisciplinary understanding of how to reach children, but also how to change policies and practices,” he adds.

Teaching License

Students in the Learning and Teaching concentration earn a Washington, D.C. teaching license in the second year of program, receiving direct guidance and mentoring from clinical faculty members and learning concrete skills to improve instructional practice through coursework.

At the end of the program, students understand the interconnected practices of teaching and policymaking, curricular design and educational leadership.

“Whether our students go into the classroom or into policy, we want everyone in this program to know what amazing teaching looks like and what it takes to ensure that every child has an amazing teacher,” says Reed, author of Building the Federal Schoolhouse: Localism and the American Education State (Oxford University Press, 2014). “Too many kids in too many classrooms aren’t getting that. That’s what we’re focused on.”

Learning and Design

The mission of the new Master of Arts in Learning and Designis to give students a deep foundation in the tools and theory of learning design, technology innovation, learning analyticsand higher education leadership.

The program is stewarded by Georgetown’s Center for New Designs in Learning and Scholarship (CNDLS), directed by Eddie Maloney, a professor of English, who is also founding director of the new master’s program.

Through design projects and internships, Maloney says students pursuing the degree will learn from the center’s 17 years of experience working with faculty, departments and students to respond to the challenges facing higher education and student success.

Inflection Point

“We are at an inflection point in higher education, where sustaining and deepening the foundations of residential education is as important as agilely responding to disruptions caused by new technologies and concerns about curriculum, costs and value,” Maloney says. “Georgetown’s long history of higher education innovation in teaching and learning combined with its deep commitment to core values makes it a unique place from which to educate the next generation of leaders in instructional design, educational technology, learning analytics and academic transformation.”

In the first year of the Learning and Design program, students enroll in a set of foundational courses and choose one of four tracks – Learning Design, Technology Innovation, Learning Analytics and Higher Education Leadership.

In the second year, students enroll in the Design Studio and elective courses.

Rich Portfolio

“Students will benefit from a program in applied innovation that marries theory with experience in internships, mentoring projects, and a yearlong Design Studio,” Maloney says. “These experiences will give all our students a rich portfolio of real world work that can serve as the foundation on which they can build their careers.”

The master’s programs will be housed within the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences.

“We are excited to work with faculty dedicated to interdisciplinary research in education,” says Sheila McMullan, the school’s vice dean. “We are confident they will deliver two quality programs to our future students.