Course Work, Independent Research Proposal, or Thesis?

[Westernford17]

Hi all! I'm new here but looking for some advice.

 

In an incredible life-plot-twist, I recently accepted my offer of admission to the University of Western Ontario's English MA program. The circumstances that led to my applying UWO actually have very little to do with the school or program itself - it's only after I applied (perhaps for the wrong reasons), was accepted, and was offered substantial funding that I really began to consider it as a legitimate option. Now that I've looked into it a bit more, I'm really looking forward to going in the fall and I think the program/faculty is a really good fit for me.

 

Anyway, it's about time for me to register for classes, and UWO offers three "degree options" for MA candidates. The list below is straight from the department website. 

1. Course work: This involves the completion of four full-year (or equivalent) courses and one half-year bibliographical methods course.
2. Course work and Independent Research Project (IRP): This involves the completion of three full-year (or equivalent) courses and the submission of a 50-page IRP, researched and developed in close consultation with a faculty supervisor.
3. Course work and Thesis: This involves the completion of two full-year (or equivalent) courses and the submission and oral defense of a 100-page thesis, researched and developed in close consultation with a faculty supervisory committee (supervisor and second reader).

I have no idea which option I should choose.

 

A mentor suggested to me that I do the course work and thesis option (Option 3), noting that some PHD programs require an MA thesis for admission. The thing is, I don't currently have plans to get a PHD. I may one day, but I'm not there yet and it isn't currently a part of my plan. So... I guess I'm thinking it would be really bad if a few years down the line I decided I wanted one and then couldn't get into a program because I didn't do a Master's thesis.

 

At the same time, I'm really interested in the courses - I like being in the classroom and discussing material much much more than I like doing independent research. In the end, I'm sort of torn between doing the course option (which I want) or the thesis option (to maintain that potential for a PHD if I choose to go that route). Of course IRP is a good compromise option :-)

 

I should note that When it comes to choosing the best option for my future, I don't really know what my future entails yet. I don't have any plans and I'm the sort of person that takes his life day by day (while being prepared for tomorrow's opportunities). Part of what makes it hard to know what's best is that I don't know what my end goal will be. 

 

Does anybody have any suggestions or input? I don't know a whole lot about the norms for MA programs... is it typical to write a thesis? Is it frowned upon to only take courses? I can think of some obvious advantages and disadvantages to all three options, but how does the academic world (and the rest of you) see things?

 

Thanks for your help!

 

Edited June 14, 2014 by OhMyGodric17

[poliscar]

I don't know of any doctoral programs that require an MA thesis for entry. Honestly, I'm not sure where you mentor got that from, but it's not accurate information. You aren't going to be penalized by a PhD program for not having written a thesis. It can be a very helpful option for a numbers of reasons (LoRs, writing sample, depth of research interests, etc) but it isn't necessary. 

Based on that, choose the option you are most interested in. If you find that you want to apply to PhD programs later on, a seminar paper is enough for a writing sample. 

 

Also, to put my earlier statement into context: the English MA program at U of T is composed entirely of coursework. As far as I know, they don't have a thesis option for MA students. Despite this, many of their students continue on to doctoral programs. 

Edited June 14, 2014 by poliscar

[Dr. Old Bill]

If most Ph.D. programs required a Master's thesis for entry, I suspect this forum would be pretty sparsely inhabited... Perhaps things are different in certain Canadian institutions, but nothing I've seen in the U.S. has any similar indication. And remember: the majority of Ph.D. programs admit students with only a B.A., which often means no thesis. So I think you can safely disregard your mentor's advice on this count.

 

Like Poliscar says, there are some advantages to having a large written work to your name. You might want to consider the Courswork / Independent Study option, as it would allow you to demonstrate a specialization interest while also giving you ample material with which to draw from for your writing sample. It would also give you some good fodder for your SoP. Having said that, 50 pages is pretty large for an IP...basically thesis length at most institutions. So there's certainly no shame in opting for coursework along, so long as you can still provide the requisite 15-25 page writing sample most Ph.D. programs require.

[Between Fields]

It seems like option 2 would actually be a better fit for going on to PhD programs. From what I've seen, most don't require an MA thesis for admission, and will actually have you take extra classes to make up deficiencies in the breadth of your MA education, so it's to your benefit to take a wide range of courses (well, as wide as is prudent in your sub-field). Plus, as previous posters have said, it gives you more papers to draw your sample from and more experience adapting to the different writing demands of graduate courses. A one year program isn't a huge amount of time to write a 100 page thesis. It can certainly be done, but it seems like you'd be cramming research and writing into the same time-space, and it seems like your time for revision would be pretty slim. I wrote a thesis, but I was in a two-year program and I had a really strong desire to write one from the beginning. That IRP seems like a better use of one year, and a nice compromise among your three options.

[queennight]

Also, keep in mind that for each of your half-year courses, assuming that UWO runs its MA program the same way as most other Canadian universities, you'll be required to complete a 20-25 page paper for each half-year graduate course (or 2 for a full-year). So that means in terms of actual page count:

 

1) Course Work: (equivalent to 9 half courses) 180 pages minimum

2) IRP: (equivalent to 6 half courses + 50) 170 pages minimum

3) Thesis: (equivalent to 4 half courses + 100) 180 pages minimum

 

All three options work out to about the same page-counts, so really the only difference is that you lose out on writing more individualized/differentiated topics. Hope that helped! (And hope my math wasn't too terrible.)

[Westernford17]

Wow, thanks for all of the incredible input! 

 

Like I said, I really didn't have any idea how most MA programs run things - I was under the impression that masters theses, especially in a one year program, were actually pretty rare until my mentor said that. She said that she worked with a colleague that was forced to basically go and write a thesis since she hadn't already done that in her MA, but it sounds like that's pretty rare. Oh well. It just makes things easier!

 

 

Also, keep in mind that for each of your half-year courses, assuming that UWO runs its MA program the same way as most other Canadian universities, you'll be required to complete a 20-25 page paper for each half-year graduate course (or 2 for a full-year). So that means in terms of actual page count:

 

1) Course Work: (equivalent to 9 half courses) 180 pages minimum

2) IRP: (equivalent to 6 half courses + 50) 170 pages minimum

3) Thesis: (equivalent to 4 half courses + 100) 180 pages minimum

 

All three options work out to about the same page-counts, so really the only difference is that you lose out on writing more individualized/differentiated topics. Hope that helped! (And hope my math wasn't too terrible.)

 

Also, that's great news. I guess I hadn't really considered figuring it mathematically

 

It sounds like it's either Option 1 or 2 for me! (I'm leaning quite strongly towards 2)