<p>Preferably private, not religion affiliated, and a well known school.
Thank you!</p>
<p>I have never heard of such a thing. What do you want to study that doesn’t fit any regular degree program?</p>
<p>You can get one of those, but it’s from a diploma mill instead of an accredited school.</p>
<p>I think finding an existing program that would allow you to do research on the topic that interests you is better than building a program yourself. What is it you want to do, both in school and after you would graduate?</p>
<p>I can think of a certain school that is accredited and hence is not a diploma mill - and also fulfills the OP’s requirements of being private, non-religiously affiliated, and is fairly well known - where you have substantial freedom to design your own master’s degree program. As long as you pass a minimum number of graduate-level units that can come from whatever combination of departments you like, and then write an ‘approved’ master’s thesis which simply means that it needs to be signed by just a single faculty member - and which may have no relationship whatsoever with the coursework you took - to earn a master of science degree. For example, you could construct an interdisciplinary social science program via a customized patchwork of courses from economics, poli-sci, philosophy, and business administration/mgmt and obtain a signature for a thesis that encompasses that coursework - or even encompasses none of it - and earn a master’s degree. </p>
<p>Granted, it would be a so-called “master’s degree without specification”, as opposed to a master’s degree that is specifically denoted as granted from, say, the EECS or the economics department. But so what? It’s still a master’s degree from a school that I would argue has an, um, ‘fairly respectable’ brand name. {Also, strictly speaking, you do technically require approval of a committee, however, I have never heard of anybody ever who could obtain a faculty thesis signature yet could not obtain committee approval. In fact, it’s hard for me to believe that that committee would ever oppose the will of that faculty advisor who believes that your thesis is worthy of a master’s degree.}</p>
<p>More details are [url=<a href=“Welcome! < MIT”>Welcome! < MIT]here[/url</a>].</p>
<p>Morefreedom - why does it matter whether or not the school is private or religiously affiliated? Most schools with an “affiliation” don’t actually practice it (especially in grad school) and many public universities are better than a lot of the private ones.</p>
<p>I am also curious to know what you plan to do with a self-designed master’s degree. The program sakky linked to is intriguing, but graduate school is supposed to be about further specialization in one or two areas of study (even if that ‘area’ is an interdisciplinary one, it usually has a main thrust or two).</p>
<p>University of Chicago has the MAPH - Master of Arts Program in the Humanities - that sounds similar to what the OP requested.</p>
<p>I agree with the general sentiment that a “design-your-own MA” is sort of missing the point of graduate study, though.</p>
<p>Sakky, </p>
<p>The degree program from MIT that you noted is not what you think - it does not let you “design your own master’s degree.” The masters “without specification” simply means that the recipient did not qualify for the specifications normally offered by the department (if any). You still must be admitted to a specific department, and your advisor (from that department) still has some authority over your course of study. It has only slightly more flexibility than the usual degree, at the cost of the specificity.</p>
<p>As an example, the Architecture Department awards an M.Arch., an S.M. in Architecture Studies, an S.M. in Building Technology, and an S.M. in Visual Studies. If you graduate from the department without qualifying in one of these areas (usually as a result of dropping out of doctoral study), you get an S.M. without specification. It still lists the Architecture Department on the diploma.</p>
<p>Are you talking about something like this? This one is at Dartmouth.</p>
<p>[MALS</a> - Master of Arts in Liberal Studies](<a href=“Home | Master of Arts in Liberal Studies Program”>Home | Master of Arts in Liberal Studies Program)</p>
<p>I think what you are looking for are colleges with “open curriculums” like Smith and Brown.
Just google "open curriculum and see what you get.
also try - [College</a> Lists / Open Curriculum - schools with more flexible curricula](<a href=“College Lists Wiki / Open Curriculum - schools with more flexible curricula”>College Lists Wiki / Open Curriculum - schools with more flexible curricula)</p>
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<p>Uh, are you seriously arguing that I do not understand what the MIT master’s degree without specification actually entails? Are you sure you want to challenge me on that point? Let me ask you - have you studied at MIT? </p>
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<p>What you neglected is that once admitted to one department, you are free to switch to another, as long as the new department accepts you. Many will. You are then also concurrently free to switch advisors. </p>
<p>Heck, you don’t even technically need to have an advisor from your own department. All you technically need is a ‘reader’ from your department - whose purpose is basically to serve as a signee- while your true advisor can be from any other department. Your thesis will then require signatures from two people - your reader and your true advisor - but that’s hardly a difficult requirement to surmount, as most departments have some faculty who willingly serve as readers. {Heck, I suspect that many ‘readers’ ironically probably never actually read your thesis.} </p>
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<p>On the contrary, the master’s without specification offers substantial flexibility over and above the usual degree, as, like I said, you can take a combination of graduate courses from any department that you want, and then even write a thesis that may have nothing to do with that coursework whatsoever. Let me give you an example below.</p>
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<p>One could theoretically obtain a master’s degree without specification from the architecture department:</p>
<p>1) Without having taken even a single architecture course
2) Without having an advisor from the architecture department (but rather just a reader from the department)
3) Without writing a master’s thesis that has anything to do with architecture whatsoever (as long as you can find an Architecture reader and a true advisor from any other department who will approve). </p>
<p>I would argue that that represents a substantial difference between the specified programs within the Arch department.</p>
<p>Of course, anyone interested in such a degree should know that funding for such studies would likely be entirely out of one’s own pocket.</p>
<p>Polarscribe, let’s face it, the funding for many (probably most) master’s degrees - with specification or not - are entirely out of your own pocket.</p>
<p>I imagine it’s a lot harder to get an employer to cover a degree without specification than one part of an established program.</p>
<p>sakky:</p>
<p>Just out of curiosity, do many folks apply directly to the Unspecified SM, or is it really targeted more towards those doctoral candidates who fall off the dissertation bandwagon?</p>
<p>Sakky: Most academic master’s programs have at least some opportunities for funding, tied to departmental needs. The programs discussed here likely have zero opportunities. That’s a significant issue for applicants to consider.</p>
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<p>I actually strongly suspect that that’s false at least at MIT (which as far as I can tell, is the only school where such a discussion would matter anyway). Funding for academic master’s programs tend to be professor-oriented (as opposed to departmentally oriented). If somebody - whether your advisor, reader, or anybody else, wants to bring you on as a research or teaching assistant, then you’ve just secured yourself a source of funding, regardless of what degree specification you’re obtaining. </p>
<p>As a case in point, I even knew some MIT MBA students who obtained (partial) funding as TA’s for engineering classes. (Granted, they did have prior engineering degrees). If even an MBA student can serve as an engineering TA, I don’t see why a student pursuing a master’s degree without specification couldn’t do the same.</p>
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<p>Perhaps. But on the other hand, I think a strong counterargument could be made that the employer would benefit by having an employer who is being educated at arguably the most prestigious technical school in the world, even if the degree is without specification. That would seem to be a better deal, at least to some employers, then sending their employees to be educated at an average school. </p>
<p>Besides, I don’t know why we’re even talking about the issue of funding anyway. The OP never raised the issue, and indeed indicated that he preferred a private (and hence probably more expensive) school anyway. The OP simply asked whether there were well-known schools that allowed you to design your own master’s degree. I think that question has now been satisfactorily answered. The OP never asked about what types of funding sources are available for such a degree, which is a fundamentally different question. </p>
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<p>I said it before and I’ll say it again: many, perhaps most, terminal master’s (as opposed to PhD) students at MIT are paying their own way. Yet that doesn’t seem to deter them.</p>
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<p>Actually, I have never heard of a doctoral candidate who, as you put it, ‘fell off the dissertation bandwagon’ who then pursued an unspecified master’s. While they might exist, my sense is that they are extremely rare. Most PhD students who are unable to complete the PhD will almost certainly at least have been able to complete the requirements for a specified master’s within their department. Generally speaking, if you’re admitted to a MIT PhD program, then you’re one of the most motivated and talented graduate students in the world for that particular discipline, and so completing a specified (consolation) master’s degree within that discipline should not present a serious hurdle. </p>
<p>Nor is the unspecified master’s program something that most students would ‘apply’ to directly. Many unspecified master’s students actually were admitted to specified master’s programs and then perhaps lost interest in that specification somewhere along the way. Perhaps only a handful would actually state in their application from the very beginning that they intend to pursue an unspecified master’s.</p>
<p>But actually, at least from what I’ve seen, by far the most common reason that somebody will pursue an unspecified master’s is that they are already pursuing a (specified) graduate degree in one department, and want to pursue a second graduate degree in another department, but without having to fulfill all of the coursework requirements to obtain a degree with specification in that second department. This sometimes happens with, say, Sloan MBA students who want to pick up an additional MS (actually an “SM” in MIT parlance) as well, but don’t want to concentrate their additional coursework to the extent necessary to earn an SM with specification. So they’ll take an SM without specification, hence graduating with dual master’s (MBA + SM). </p>
<p>To be clear, I am not trying to imply that the unspecified master’s at MIT is particularly commonplace. It is not. Nevertheless, it’s a nice option to have, and some students take advantage of it.</p>
<p>I’m not sure why you think MIT is the only university where this matters. There are many other universities not named MIT that students may be considering.</p>