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Program Requirements for Master of Social Science
Applicable only to students admitted during the 2019-2020 academic year.
Social Science
College of Letters and Science
Graduate Degrees
The Interdepartmental Program in Social Science offers the Master’s degree in Social Science (MaSS).
Master’s Degree
Advising
The Student Affairs Officer will counsel students on visas, enrollment, graduation requirements, and other relevant issues. The Academic Program Director and the Chair of the Interdepartmental Program (IDP) will advise students on matters pertaining to the academic program.
Areas of Study
N/A
Foreign Language Requirement
Not required.
Course Requirements
Students must be enrolled full time during one year (three quarters with a minimum of 12 units per quarter) and complete 36 units (nine courses) of course work. The course work consists of seven core MaSS program graduate courses (400 series), and two elective courses either at the graduate (200 series) or upper division (100 series) level. All courses must be taken for a letter grade.
Students must complete the 36 units (nine courses) as follows:
Fall Quarter
- SOC SC 400A (four units): This course introduces students to research paradigms, interpretive approaches, and key concepts in social science inquiry.
- SOC SC 401 (four units): This course introduces students to key concepts and approaches to qualitative research and provides hands-on experience with qualitative research methods.
- SOC SC 402 (four units): This course introduces students to the fundamentals of data analysis and statistics, focusing on the application of statistical methods in social problems research.
Winter Quarter
- SOC SC 400B (four units): This course introduces students to research paradigms, interpretive approaches, and key concepts in social science inquiry.
- SOC SC 430 (four units): This course introduces students to the theory and practice of community-based research.
- Elective Course (four units): The elective course will be selected from graduate course offerings by departments in the Division of Social Sciences and other campus units.
Spring Quarter
- SOC SC 410 (four units): This course introduces students to the theory and practice of “engaged social science” as an emerging orientation to transformative research.
- SOC SC 420 (four units): This course guides students toward completion of the capstone paper.
- Elective Course (four units): The elective course will be selected from graduate course offerings by departments in the Division of Social Sciences and other campus units.
Teaching Experience
Not required.
Field Experience
Not required.
Capstone Plan
Students are required to complete a capstone paper. Students must obtain approval of their topic and research plan from the Academic Program Director. Three faculty members will serve as readers for each paper; readers will be designated by the end of the winter quarter. Faculty readers will provide feedback and evaluate the final submission to determine the student’s satisfactory fulfillment of this requirement.
Thesis Plan
None.
Time-to-Degree
The normative time-to-degree is three quarters. The time line for the master’s degree is described in the Course Requirements section.
| DEGREE | NORMATIVE TIME TO ATC (Quarters) | NORMATIVE TTD | MAXIMUM TTD |
| Master of Social Science | 3 | 3 | 4 |
Termination of Graduate Study and Appeal of Termination
University Policy
A student who fails to meet the above requirements may be recommended for termination of graduate study. A graduate student may be disqualified from continuing in the graduate program for a variety of reasons. The most common is failure to maintain the minimum cumulative grade point average (3.00) required by the Academic Senate to remain in good standing. Other examples include lack of timely progress toward the degree and poor performance in core courses. Probationary students (those with cumulative grade point averages below 3.00) may be subject to immediate dismissal upon the recommendation of their department. University guidelines governing termination of graduate students, including the appeal procedure, are outlined in Standards and Procedures for Graduate Study at UCLA.