Graduate Certificate

The Interdisciplinary Programs in the College of Arts and Sciences offer a Graduate Certificate of Credit in Interdisciplinary Programs with concentrations in Linguistics, in Medieval Studies, and in Women's Studies.

Rationale: A Graduate Certificate will draw upon existing faculty strength across disciplines in the College of Arts and Sciences, which has long offered a B.A. in various concentrations under Interdisciplinary Programs. The Graduate Certificate will build on those Concentrations and will serve a diverse student body: graduate students who are enrolled in other M.A. programs and who have an interest in adding an interdisciplinary component to their programs, students who wish to further their education in an interdisciplinary area without enrolling in an M.A. program, and community members who seek alternate routes to educational enrichment than those offered by existing departmental master's degree programs. With increasing visibility of interdisciplinary scholarship and viability of interdisciplinary programs, a Graduate Certificate of Credit will fill a void in UTK's Graduate School offerings.

Concentration In Women's Studies

Purpose: The Graduate Certificate in Women's Studies will develop critical thinking about the economic, social, and legal factors influencing women's roles in  contemporary and historical societies, evaluating those roles in the widest possible perspectives. Students may examine representations of women in the arts and the media, evaluate how science and medicine view women as objects of study, and study how women work as practitioners and researchers in those fields. The program is designed to provide a supplementary perspective for students already enrolled in graduate programs, to provide an entry into graduate study for those who are exploring a number of disciplinary approaches, to provide enrichment for members of the community who have a BA or an advanced degree, and to develop skills for professionals in various fields.

Admission: Students must be admitted to the Graduate School and have a minimum GPA of 3.0. Students additionally must make a separate application for admission to the graduate certificate program in Women's Studies. Applications for admission to the graduate certificate program are made to the Chair of Women's Studies in a written statement of interest and experience, a tentative plan of study, and an indication of a potential advisor from Women's Studies faculty having interests in common with the student. A formal advisor will be assigned by the Chair at the time of admission. Applications may be submitted throughout the academic year. Students may combine the graduate certificate in Women's Studies with graduate work in other formal degree programs or may pursue the graduate certificate as a course of study independent of a formal degree program.

Requirements: A minimum of  fifteen credit hours is required.  Students may apply at any time in their course of study; however, a program advisor from Women's Studies faculty must approve all courses in the individual's  program of study. A certificate cannot be earned without program approval by the advisor.  Where appropriate, coursework taken to meet requirements in the student's home department may also be credited toward the certificate program, pending approval by the Women's Studies advisor.

• Women's Studies 510 - Special Topics: Theory and Methods. Substitutions may be made for this course, where appropriate, with the consent of the Chair of Women's Studies.
  
  
• Nine additional hours, drawn from at least two different disciplines. For students enrolled in an MA program, no more than two of the certificate courses may be drawn from that program or the department in which the MA program is housed. Students are encouraged to select from courses at the 500 level and above. The following courses, which have been approved for graduate credit, would fit in this concentration:(1)
  
  Anthropology 517 Forms of Social Inequality; English 584 Topics in Feminist Studies; Health 420 Sex Education As It Relates to Human Sexuality; Health 520 Sex Education and Human Sexuality; Public Health 585 Seminar in Gerontology ;Law 849 Discrimination and the Law; Law 862 Family Law; Law 958 Women and the Law; Women's Studies 400 Topics in Women's' Studies; Women's  Studies 410 Gender and Role Development: Implications for Education and Counseling; Women's Studies 422 Women Writers in Britain; Women's Studies 425 Women's Health; Women's Studies 434 Psychology of Gender; Women's Studies 466 Rhetoric of the Woman's Rights Movement to 1930; Women's Studies 469 Sexuality and Cinema; Women's Studies 476 Rhetoric of the Contemporary Feminist Movement; Women's Studies 483 African-American Women in American Society; Women's Studies 510 Special Topics (in addition to theory and methods listed above); Women's Studies 593 Independent Study. Where appropriate, special topics courses may be substituted for any of the above courses with the permission of the program advisor and the Chair of the Women's Studies Program.
  
  
• A capstone experience such as presenting research results to a group, submitting a work for publication, arranging an exhibit, or presenting a performance.
  
  

(1) In some instances, students must seek approval from the home department in order to enroll in graduate courses.

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