Requirements
The Master’s in Applied Linguistics is a 30-credit program that must be completed within a five year period from the time of matriculation. In order to remain active, students need to take one course per semester; however current financial aid requirements state that students MUST take a minimum of SIX credits (two classes) every fall and spring semester in order to maintain aid. In order to complete the elective requirements (two courses) students may take courses in the summer semester or an additional course during the fall or spring semesters.
Upon completion of all coursework, students must also complete a four-hour written comprehensive exam that assesses their understanding of and ability to use all of the content of the coursework of this program.
The program has three components:
Core Requirements (students are required to take five courses):
APLING 601 Linguistics
APLING 603 Cross-Cultural Perspectives
APLING 605 Theories and Principles of Language Teaching
APLING 621 Psycholinguistics
APLING 623 Sociolinguistics
Choose a concentration from the two choices below and complete the three required courses for that concentration:
ESL Studies (ESL)
APLING 618 Teaching ESL: Methods and Approaches
APLING 614 Foundations of Bilingual/Multicultural Education
APLING 698 Field Experience
Foreign Language Pedagogy (FL)
APLING 611 Methods and Materials in Foreign Language Education
APLING 612 Integrating Culture into the Language Curriculum
APLING 698 Field Experience
Students must also take two courses as electives. These two elective courses may be courses from the other concentration or any of the electives that we offer online:
• APLING 635 Literacy and culture
• APLING 629: Structure of the English language
• APLING 625: Second language acquisition
• APLING 637: Ethnography of language, culture, and learning
• APLING 678: Language and Technology
• APLING 669: Writing theories
• APLING 670: Testing
• APLING 665 Interdisciplinary Curriculum Development: Contemporary Perspectives on Immigration
Final Exercise
All students who are degree candidates must successfully pass a four-hour long written comprehensive exam as part of their capstone project.
Field Experience
The field experience is required of all students who have had no on-site teaching experience. This requirement can be satisfied through teaching in university undergraduate ESL or FL classes, in a public school system, or at a community agency.
Students, who are currently teaching or have had substantial experience teaching in a language classroom, may apply for a waiver of the Field Experience requirement. If students obtain a waiver, they must replace the field experience with a 3-credit elective course in order to complete the 30 graduate credits required for your degree.
Transfer Credit
Applicants who have completed graduate course work at other accredited institutions may transfer toward the completion of a UMass Boston graduate degree up to 6 credits from such courses in which the applicant received a grade of B or higher. Applicants who have completed graduate course work at UMass Boston as a non-degree student may transfer toward the completion of a UMass Boston graduate degree up to 6 credits from such courses in which the applicant received a grade of B or higher. These courses may be accepted for transfer provided that they:
* have not been used to fulfill requirements for another degree, and
* were earned no more than seven years before matriculation in the program into which the student wishes to transfer credit.
* “Prior course work must be equivalent and relevant to course work offered in the program for transfer credit to be awarded.
The combined total of courses transferred from other institutions and from UMass Boston courses taken as a non-degree student may not exceed 12 credits. Accepted students who wish to take non-degree courses in the semester between acceptance and matriculation that will take them over the 6-credit transfer limit may petition their program director to grant them a Pre-Matriculation Transfer Waiver.
Transfer credit is subject to the final approval of the graduate program director and the Dean of Graduate Studies.
