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Master of Arts 4+1 Program (BFA/MA)
The Art Education department has shown me how passionate I am about being an educator and how much I can make a difference in the world. It has been such a valuable and rewarding experience with amazing support from the faculty and my peers.
- Audrey Fricker '19 BFA/MA
The BFA/MA qualifies MassArt Art Education students to apply for the Massachusetts initial teaching license. After three years of teaching on the initial teaching license, graduates may apply for a Massachusetts professional teaching license without further coursework.
MassArt students who are earning their BFA in Art Education may apply for this MA program in the spring term before they would have taken the student teaching practicum. They arrange to graduate at the end of that spring term with 120 credits, having passed a required 3-credit teaching internship but without completing the 6-credit student teaching practicum, which is undertaken as part of the MA program of study. The MA program begins in the summer that immediately follows their 120-credit BFA graduation. International students are not eligible for this program when AETE 654 and AETE 549 are both offered online.
This program leads to the following professional licenses: Educator Licensure through MTEL in MA.
*Refer the Council for the Accreditation of Educator Preparation (CAEP) or the National Education Association (NEA) for your state’s professional licensure agency contact information to determine whether MassArt’s program meets your state’s requirements for licensure.
learning outcomes
- Appreciate the role of art practice at the center of quality art teaching and art learning, and and reinvigorate and enhance studio practices as members of the field of practicing, contemporary artists
- Apply art learning and teaching skills and attitudes in curriculum development, instruction, and assessment
- Refine their studio practices as contemporary artists;
- Understand the critical contexts of art education through lenses of the contemporary, the historical, and social justice
- Understand and participate in presentation practices (professional practice) and out-of-classroom roles as educational leaders within and beyond their schools and districts
Unique to MassArt
In 2018-2019, MassArt began offering two innovative "4 + 1" Art Education programs to enable students to complete both their Bachelors and Masters degrees in five years.
The BFA/MA program allows for deeper familiarity within context of teaching, art-making, and exhibiting. This unique program allows students to develop a personal art practice with peer student artists across disciplines.
From Our Students
"The BFA/MA program gave me the option to explore reality and the sociopolitical situation that is happening in our society and delve deep into my own cultural identity and figure out who, what and why I identify a certain way." - Amanda Lamoretti '19 BFA/MA
"The BFA/MA program is a great opportunity to simplify the process of getting your professional license. As someone looking at teaching in public schools in particular it is a valuable program to be able to participate in" - Julia Austein '19 BFA/MA
"My greatest take away from my time at MassArt is the realization that I will have a continuous community of teaching artists that will support me long after I have graduated. As we enter into our teaching roles, many of which will be within public school systems, we may not always have the same immediate support and collaborative structure as at MassArt. Even so, knowing that I will always have my cohort of colleagues with whom I have learned so much is an immeasurable resource." - Dani DeVellis '19 BFA/MA