Graduate Certificate in Teaching English
The Graduate Certificate is intended for prospective or current English teachers who plan to teach dual-credit, college-level English courses (i.e., courses that count for both high school and college credit). To obtain the certificate, students will take 18 semester credit hours of graduate English content courses. Credit earned for the certificate can be counted towards one of the three Master’s programs in the English Department (English & American Literature, Rhetoric & Writing Studies, or the Master of Arts in Teaching English).
Admission Requirements
1. A bachelor’s degree from an accredited U.S. institution or proof of equivalent education at a foreign institution.
2. The bachelor’s degree must be in English or the applicant must have 12 hours of advanced-level English courses.
3. GPA of 3.0 or above.
4. An analytical writing sample.
5. A statement of purpose.
6. Names of three professional references who may be asked to write letters.
Conditional admittance will be given if the application materials show potential for success but are lacking in one area (such as the GPA). In this case, students will need to take one graduate class in English/Rhetoric & Writing Studies, and receive a B or A in the class before they can be fully admitted into the program.
Degree Requirements
Required Courses
There are no required courses. The student selects courses from the Prescribed Elective Course list below. If a student is interested in the rhetoric sequence, taking RWS 5322 Rhetorical Theory and RWS 5309 is strongly recommended.
Prescribed Elective Courses
The Department of English has three (3) programmatic areas; each offers a graduate degree and courses of graduate study. Ideally, if the student wants broad preparation he/she will select two (2) courses from each area; however, a student has the option of taking one (1) course from each area and focusing the remaining three (3) courses in a single area. For the certificate, students will select 6 courses from the following prescribed elective courses:
| Code | Title | Hours |
|---|---|---|
| Rhetoric & Writing Studies | ||
| RWS 5309 | Intro to Rhetoric & Writing St | 3 |
| RWS 5311 | Persuasion and Argument | 3 |
| RWS 5314 | Multimodal Composing | 3 |
| RWS 5322 | Rhetorical Theory | 3 |
| RWS 5328 | Special Topics in RWS | 3 |
| RWS 5383 | Global Rhetorics | 3 |
| English & American Literature | ||
| ENGL 5300 | Approach-Methods & Bibliog. | 3 |
| ENGL 5302 | British Literature 1485-1660 | 3 |
| ENGL 5301 | British Literature to 1485 | 3 |
| ENGL 5303 | British Literature 1660-1832 | 3 |
| ENGL 5304 | British Lit 1832-Present | 3 |
| ENGL 5305 | Am. Lit: Exploration to 1800 | 3 |
| ENGL 5306 | American Literature 1800-1865 | 3 |
| ENGL 5307 | American Literature 1865-1945 | 3 |
| ENGL 5308 | American Lit 1945-Present | 3 |
| ENGL 5321 | Literature of the Americas | 3 |
| ENGL 5322 | Literature and Culture | 3 |
| ENGL 5323 | Multi-Cult Lit: Theory & Pract | 3 |
| ENGL 5324 | Multi-Cult Lit: Special Topics | 3 |
| ENGL 5325 | Genre: Theory and Practice | 3 |
| English Education | ||
| ENGL 5339 | Intro to Secondary English | 3 |
| ENGL 5341 | Eng Studies in the Borderlands | 3 |
| ENGL 5342 | Digital Lit and the Lang Arts | 3 |
| ENGL 5345 | Writing to Learn | 3 |
| Total Hours | 18 | |