The Master of Liberal Arts Program provides learners with the unique ability to pursue a highly customized interdisciplinary graduate degree program, developed according to their own interests, while building broad analytical and problem-solving skills that reach across the boundaries of academic disciplines and beyond the structured format of traditional graduate degree programs.
The MLA degree is based on "The Search for Order," a theme that explores rational, intuitive, and empirical ways of knowing and learning.
Graduate Program Director:
Dr. Will Kiblinger
kiblingerw@winthrop.edu
803/323-4598
Graduate Assistantships
Students have the opportunity to work in their departments and around campus as graduate assistants and associates.
AGLSP Member
Winthrop's Master of Liberal Arts program has been a full member of the Association of Graduate Liberal Studies Programs (AGLSP) since 1995.
Concentrations Available
Our Master of Liberal Arts program offers a general track as well as a concentration in Political and Civic Engagement and a concentration in Criminology and Criminal Justice*.
Students have the opportunity to tailor the MLA program to their educational and professional interests and gain a better sense of what it means to be a human being.
Time to Completion: 1-2 years
Total Credits: 30
Format: Campus-based
Curriculum (MLA)
This program motivates students of the political and civic engagement concentration to create the connection between the academic study of politics and its actual practice and effects.
Time to Completion: 1-2 years
Total Credits: 30
Format: Campus-based
Curriculum (MLA - Political and Civic Engagement)
This program offers a focused program designed to create connections between the academic study of criminology and its broader context in the social sciences. Students will learn how the criminal justice system works, how to understand challenging issues within the system, and how to address various social issues connected with crime.
*This concentration is pending approval from the South Carolina Commission on Higher Education.
Time to Completion: 2 years
Total Credits: 31-32
Format: Campus-Based
Potential applicants with questions can contact the program director, Dr. Will Kiblinger, at kiblingerw@winthrop.edu or 803/323-4598.
Master of Liberal Arts (all concentrations): Rolling admissions for Fall and Spring admission only.
Note: All admission materials must be received by the Graduate Studies office before an application will be reviewed.
Application requirements for the Master of Liberal Arts program include:
The online Graduate Studies application with the non-refundable application fee.
Bachelor of Arts/Bachelor of Science degree with a 3.0 overall GPA.
Official transcript(s) from all institutions attended for undergraduate and graduate coursework. Transcripts must be sent directly to Winthrop's Graduate Studies office from the issuing institution(s).
A personal statement of approximately 250-300 words outlining your interest in pursuing the program.
Two letters of recommendation.
"Winthrop University’s Master of Liberal Arts helped me to gain a deeper understanding of issues I care about in the social sciences by teaching them through an interdisciplinary approach through the “three eyes”—rationality, empiricism, and intuition. In addition to small class sizes and professors that genuinely care about student learning, this program prepared me to enter an interdisciplinary Ph.D. program in the social sciences. The nature of the program helped me to hone my research skills and gain a better understanding of important concepts in the social science—two things that have helped me most in my Ph.D. program today."
Our MLA program will help build your intellectual development through increasing your critical thinking, writing, reading and research skills. In addition, the program prepares you for a variety of advanced career goals.
Our graduates are equipped for positions that include:
Governmental and non-governmental organizations
Community development projects
Lifelong learning
Further education such as Ph.D. programs, law school, and certificate programs
*The Criminology and Criminal Justice concentration is pending approval from the South Carolina Commission on Higher Education.