Need advice for Northern Arizona University liberal arts program

I wanna study psychology or business but cause of tuitions and want to join competency based, i am interested in Northern arizona university. İ live in Turkey and working. So for career promotion, i want to get bachelor degree. İ dont interested in their small business administration program so only bachelor of arts in liberal arts degree left for me. But the weird thing is this degree dont have any major. So i am confused and asked the advisor about if i enroll this program what major i will get he sad liberal arts. And then asked may i transfer credits to other business or psychology programs but he doesnt emphasis on this.

So i wanna get some advices about:

is this university good?
What can be done with this liberal arts degree? Can i join business or psychology masters or if i want to complete another bachelor this liberal arts program will allow me to credits to others?

Regards

 

Yes, Northern Arizona is a very reputable public university which has a strong reputation in distance education. I am a huge advocate of liberal arts education so I would say "yes" liberal arts degrees are extremely useful. A good liberal arts program will enable you to develop ideas and concepts from across multiple academic disciplines. It has been said that the liberally educated person has a mind that can operate well in all fields.


You can pursue a master's in psychology upon completion of a B.A. If you are able to, take psychology electives as part of your undergrad program to ensure you meet the prerequisite courses needed for a master's psychology program.


Good luck!

 

Thanks for reply m8. İ am really appreciate it. İ asked them and they sad this personalized learning program does not have any electives. So i asked them if i complete this program which master programs i can join.

Also do you know any information about, if i study master of psychology or business programs, will i allowed to transfer thse master credits to another bachelor program like business or psychology?

 

If I understand your question correctly, I do not understand why one would pursue another bachelor's if already have a master's. Also, I do not think you can apply master credit hours towards a bachelor's degree, though each university is different.


Many master degree programs do not require have a bachelor's in that particular discipline. However, a potential student must meet the minimum undergrad course requirements for the discipline (usually 5-6 undergrad courses). For example, if you were interested in a Master's in Accounting but never took any economics, math, or business classes, you would certainly need to take some. Also, many master's programs have conditional acceptance pending the completion of bridging courses. In such instances the student with a strong GPA is accepted into the program but must complete prerequisite courses prior to gaining full access as a graduate student.


I hope that makes sense. I am quite certain an undergrad degree from NAU will qualify you for a great number of master programs.

 

You will not be able to get into most psychology master's programs with a liberal arts degree. It should be fine for an MBA.

NAU is a decent university. It has a good regional reputation. I have a master's from there so take my comment FWIW.

 

jumbodog- you are mistaken about needing an undergrad degree in psychology in order to pursue a masters. Universities typically prescribe a minimum number of undergrad hours within a discipline in order to gain admittance. Hence, as I mentioned above, one can have liberal arts degree that has the prerequisite hours in a specific discipline in order to gain admittance into a masters program.


If universities mandated that the students' undergrad must be in the same discipline as the masters they was interested in, they would be losing a fortune.

 

Well, that depends on the university. But even where a university does not require a major in the subject they require specific coursework. I don't know MA program in psychology that allows a person to be admitted based upon credit hours alone. If you know of such a school I'd love to have a link to it.

This is one of this things that is true in theory but is not realistically true. The problem with a liberal arts degree is that no one is going to be advising the student as to what courses they are going to need as per-requisites for admittance into a grad program.

So while it is not impossible to get in a psychology master's program with a liberal arts degree the person is going to have to do the following.

1. Find a school that doesn't require a major in the field.
2. Find out how many credit hours the school requires.
3. Find out what specific coursework the program requires as prerequisites.
4. Get that program to commit to accepting the courses from the undergraduate institution as meeting those prerequisites.

That's a tough row to hoe, especially number four because it's not a contract. And if the master's university decides later on they no longer want to accept that coursework the student is SOL.

 

I looked at the universities throughout Ohio and found that while an undergrad in psychology is preferred, it is certainly not required. Again, as long as the student has the number of psychology hours in their undergrad program. I enclosed the link from U. of Dayton as an example, though U. of Ohio and Akron were the same. Not sure what schools you looked at, but there are several in Ohio at least.


https://www.udayton.edu/artssciences/academics/psychology/grad/general_psych/faq.php

 

Here's a Psy.D. program and a graduate program at UC Berkeley that fits the bill. But, in fairness, you asked about MA programs where you don't need an undergrad degree in psych. Here are two programs that allow admission for people with a bachelors degree in any discipline provided you meet coursework requirements:

NYU
Pepperdine


And some other doctoral programs with similar requirements:

Stanford
The University of Pittsburgh
The University of Arizona

I didn't screen for DL options. I just wanted to see the programs which specifically state that you don't need an undergrad in psych in order to apply. Some use stronger language than others, but the fact is that these programs do exist and at some pretty reputable schools.

 

A lot of psychology graduate programs don't require a bachelor's in psychology. What I've seen many programs require is a few prerequisites such as stats, developmental psychology, and abnormal psychology. A member on the other forum decided not to get a BA in Social Science or Psychology because Capella told him/her that it wasn't needed.

Master's Degree in Clinical Counseling

A non-profit school with an online program.

Master's in Psychology Online | MS Psychology Program | SNHU

A more traditional school with an online program

M.S. Psychology Admissions | Palo Alto University

 

UMass has a Masters program in Mental Health Counseling (online). Their admissions requirements include a minimum of 5 Social Science courses. They don't even need to be Psych courses.

Master of Science in Mental Health Counseling | www.umassonline.net

 

The text from the link directly contradicts your post and supports my point.

Absolutely! However, if you are not an undergraduate psychology major, a minimum of 15 semester hours of undergraduate psychology course work is required, including introductory psychology, statistics, and research methods in psychology (or a two-course sequence in research methods in psychology).

So they do not require hours alone...they require specific coursework. It says it right there in black and white.

And as I pointed out in one of my posts above the university is in the drivers seat. If they decided that the undergraduate research course you took doesn't meet their requirements you are SOL.

 

It appears you read selectively. I stated from the onset that if one does not have a psych degree than a student would have to complete a certain number of hours as part of their undergrad program if he wanted to gain admittance into a master's program. You, however, emphatically stated that one could not get into a master's program with a liberal arts undergrad degree. I was consistent in my subsequent responses. You, however, were entirely wrong as evidence by the information provided by myself and others. At least you were consistent in that much.


On a side note, I am not sure why you are so passionate about this. This entire conversation could have been avoided if you simply read what was posted.