Art History, Literature Distance/Online Degree

Hello everyone! I am interested in a distance education/low residency/online degree in either Art History or English/Literature.

I am a traditional age student (almost 21) and I can only earn a degree that is earned through distance education because I have autism. I tried a regular university but it didn't work but I found a great, highly respected school where I can earn my BA. I am currently an undergraduate student at Goddard (a wonderful school) in the IBA program with a "major" in Fine Art and Humanities with a "minor" in poetry writing (like 75% of the IBA students :smile.

I am planning to pursue my MLIS and luckily many colleges offer online or distance education APA accredited degrees.

I want to earn an additional MA degree because I desire to become an archivist (or something of the sort) where I "specialize" in a certain field. I haven't yet decided whether I want to pursue art history or literature so I am looking for both options.

I know that I can always earn my MA at Goddard but I want to know what else is out there.

I am only interested in universities that are regionally accredited (highest by US Standards). I know that Open University offers an MA in Art History but it is located in England and I know nothing about accreditation in England, its reputation or anything of that sort. I've read a few things online that it is highly respected but I don't really trust what I read on forums written seven months ago (or longer).

Also, for those who are interested, Goddard is a really wonderful school and offers a great education. Goddard recently closed its traditional residential program not because it was strapped for money but because it had too many students and the school couldn't accommodate them all. I believe there are about 800 students in all of Goddard's programs and there is no way 800 students can fit into their dorms. I suppose they could build new dorms but it is clear that Goddard is pretty uninterested in providing a "traditional" education and since implementing its low-residency BA's enrollment has gone up because it attracts more students.

I attend the residency with the new BFA program which has really grown since it first started a few years ago. It now has over 40 students and if it grows large enough it will one day have its own residency. Even though the faculty want the IBA2/BFA program in the same residency because many students' interests overlap I know that if the program gets big enough they will offer a separate residency.

I was quite worried about the reputation and education offered at Goddard since it is "low-residency" but my worries have been put aside. The last residency I attended featured a visiting writer from Brown who owns her own press (offered a reading and workshop on experimental fiction) and a visiting anthropologist from Harvard (offered a workshop on ethnography and memoir). All of the faculty have at least an MA/MFA (often two) and many have PhDs. Math and the mathematically related sciences are obviously not huge at Goddard and the entire "math department" pretty much revolves around the faculty member who earned his PhD in math from Princeton (and has taught at Columbia, Harvard and such places). Goddard does have a "science committee" and they have begun to offer much more science related workshops at the residencies to get the artsy students more informed and interested in science since math and science are required at Goddard at the BA level.

There are currently two poet laureates on the faculty, one from Kansas and the other from New Hampshire. The one from NH teaches in my residency and it's quite intimidating to have a workshop with someone of such prestige: we all feel pretty lame handing over our "poems" for critique.

Like every college some of the professors are great and some are not so great. So far, every advisor I've had has been wonderful and I've really only heard complaints about one advisor who didn't give as much comments and response as a few students would have liked.

A really wonderful feature about Goddard (at least in the undergraduate program, I don't know about the graduate programs) that no one seems to write about is that students have the option of obtaining "course equivalency" credits. This means that a student can opt to have their transcript look more "traditional." The students that are planning on attending graduate school usually choose this option. It works out very well because a student is required to send in five packets per semester (three weeks per packet) so the student usually has five courses at three credits each (like a traditional university). So, when a student graduates, their transcript will have the title of their "course" like a "normal" transcript. For example, a student may have these course titles:

Contemporary American Poetry
Ancient Art History
Philosophy of Religion
Introduction to Cognitive Science
Aesthetics

A student usually studies one topic per packet. It's a wonderful little feature that no one probably knows exists outside of Goddard and is very useful when applying to graduate school.

Goddard has a reputation for being "radical" and ultra-liberal but the student population is very diverse. I'm not a lesbian or anything of the sort and was worried that I would be the only one not interested in "queer theory." At my residency, the students interested in such topics are a minority though I've learned much about the topic since I was previously quite ignorant about it.

Goddard costs about as much as attending a traditional university. I've read on a few forums that Goddard doesn't offer financial aid, which is false, because I receive about $3,500 in grants and the rest is paid through Stafford Unsub/Sub Loans. I am also a traditional age student earning my first BA so that might be the difference.

If anyone has any more questions about Goddard just ask them here and I'll try to answer them!

 

Western New Mexico University

 

I just found out that OU only takes students from England and Europe. That's discrimination! Maybe I can nitpick my way in through that route...

It was the only school I found that offers an MA in Art History through distance ed/online that isn't "interdisciplinary" or "individualized." But I did find an MA Program in Historic Preservation at the Savannah College of Art and Design that is online. If I'm going to do anything "individualized" or "interdisciplinary" I'm going to Goddard because I don't think anywhere else can compare to Goddard's quality with those types of programs.

I'm going to keep looking, though!

 

England and Europe, eh?

 

Although not quite Art History, the Academy of Art University offers a MFA in Fine Arts online
http://online.academyart.edu/degree_certificates/mfa/mfa_fineart_figure.html

Ft. Hays State offers a MA in Liberal Studies with an 18 credit hour concentration in Art
http://www.fhsu.edu/mls/conc/art.shtml

 

Never seen a radioactive ferret, but welcome to the forum. I hope you find the program that you seek.

 

Mansfield University Pennsylvania www.mansfield.edu offers a BA in Art History via DL. They also offer an MEd in Art Education via DL in which one can pick up a few Art History courses.

BACHELOR'S DEGREES

American Military University www.apus.edu
Burlington College www.burlington.edu
Caldwell College www.caldwell.edu
University of Houston www.uh.edu
Judson College www.judson.edu
Mary Baldwin College www.mbc.edu
Saint Mary of the Woods College www.smwc.edu
Southern New Hampshire University www.snhu.edu
Southwestern Adventist University www.swau.edu
Stephens College www.stephens.edu
Thomas Edison State College www.tesc.edu
Union Institute & University www.myunion.edu

MASTER'S DEGREES

Bennington College www.bennington.edu
California State University Dominguez Hills www.csudh.edu
Utah State University www.usu.edu

Hmm. This seems strange. These are the only three US RA DL master's programs in English listed in my 2003 Bears' Guide (which has a much more thorough subject index than the 2006 Bears' Guide). I'll go look up some old threads on DL master's programs in English. There's gotta be more than just this.

Could you enlighten me about autism? What exactly is it and how does it make it so that distance ed would be preferable to residential studies? I'm not saying I don't believe you - I just wish I knew more. By the way, if you go to a Barnes & Noble or Borders, I know I've seen college guides on the best schools for persons with disabilities.

MLIS? I take it that that stands for Master of Library and Information Science.
APA? That's the American Psychological Association. Did you mean the American Library Association?

I don't know DL library science degrees just off the top of my head, but I'll go through some old DL MLS (MLIS) threads I've participated in and hopefully you can find some DL ALA master's programs in library science.

I'm almost thinking that I remember having seen somewhere that one of the campuses of the University of Wales offers a DL master's in archival management (I know you said US RA only but, trust me, the University of Wales is a very good school and they are regarded as the equivalent of accredited in the UK system). East Tennessee State University www.etsu.edu offers an online MALS (Master of Arts in Liberal Studies), plus they also have the DL Graduate Certificate in Archival Studies that can be incorporated into the MALS.

 

If you're interested in the MA in Historic Preservation, Goucher College www.goucher.edu in Maryland also offers this degree online.

 

You could always set up an English convenience addresses by renting a Mail Boxes Etc. (or something similar) in England with a mail forwarding service, of course.

 

Heeeeeee's baaaaaaack!!!!!!!

Old threads on the dl master's in library science:

http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=30663 http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=29859 http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=25263 http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=24633 http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=23491 http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=20363 http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=19763 http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=17647 http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=10296 http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=9488

And one old thread on a dl doc in library science:

http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=28762

 

Heeeeeee's baaaaaaack!!!!!!!

http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=30188
http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=29458
http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=28158
http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=26178
http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=24602
http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=21334
http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=20981
http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=15760
http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=13736
http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=6404
http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1641
http://forums.degreeinfo.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1279

 

look here

MA English Fort Hayes State University US (summer residencies required)

MA English University of California-Irvine US (two summers of residency required)

MA English University of Maine-Orono (four consecutive summers of residency required)

MA English University of South Africa SA

MA English (Technical and Professional Communication) East Carolina University US

MA English Studies University of Southern Queensland AUS

Master of Liberal Studies (English) Fort Hayes State University US

MS English (Technical Communication) Utah State University US

PhD English Studies Nottingham University UK (research by email)

MA/PhD Literature and Criticism Indiana University of Pennsylvania US (summer residencies)

MA Humanities (Literature) California State University-Dominquez Hills US

MA Literary Linguistics University of Nottingham UK

MA Shakespeare and Theater University of Birmingham UK

MA Writing and Literature Deakin University AUS

MLitt Literature Central Queensland University AUS

MPhil Scottish Literature and Language University of Glasgow UK (some residency required)

 

Eh...maybe they meant the UK and elsewhere in Europe.

 

Wow! Where did you find all of these? You're truly amazing!