MA structure

Modular Masters degrees: a unique structure for postgraduate art and design study in the UK

About our MA structure
The MA programmes at Nottingham Trent University are structured around two modules which represent the three phases of the MA award: the Postgraduate Certificate, the Postgraduate Diploma and the Master of Arts.

The first module
The first module aims you to develop the generic skills and knowledge that the arts professions and the fields of higher research demand.

• It provides you with opportunities to engage with broader postgraduate educational experiences, and explore themes that are generic to the world of the creative industries.
• The importance of research, and the skills required to succeed in higher study in the arts, is emphasised in lectures, seminars and workshops.
• This module introduces you to the standards required for a Masters degree, and allows for individual development by allocating every student with a personal supervisor.

Supervisors will work with you during this first module to help you produce your own project plan and learning agreement. Its purpose is also to set down the working relationship between you and the supervisor and to establish the project plan and its outcomes. It allows you to think seriously about your project and all the resources that will be required to achieve your aims. This way of working develops confidence and the capacity to manage projects to a professional level. It is highly student centred and helps you to develop your own creative professional identity which stands you in good stead in the world of employment and creative endeavour. Every year our students tell us that the learning agreement is an excellent way of developing project management skills and the supervision that they receive is excellent.

During this first module, lectures are delivered to the whole MA group by some of our expert staff and visiting practitioners and theorists from the worlds of the arts, media, or business. Subject area groups also meet in subject-based workshops and individual tutorials. Specialists and experts in each subject area come to work with students in order to maintain a strong sense of each different discipline that the school provides for.

All students receive special workshops to support writing activities required for the MA, and overseas students are able to attend special language support sessions focusing on the kind of terminology and specialist language used in the art and design subject area.

The second module
The second module has two phases; the Postgraduate Diploma phase and the Masters phase. This allows you to begin to refine and focus on your project through subject specialist-based study, driven through individual activities and tutorials and subject specialist lectures and seminars.

Evening events continue, to allow you to appreciate the importance of high level presentation skills, and there is also a study visit during this phase. Last year, students visited Antwerp and Paris to attend a series of exhibitions, trade and cultural events. The year before, they visited the Berlin Biennale. Overseas students who require language support can continue to attend special classes aimed at helping develop writing and verbal presentation skills to standards required for the award.

The third phase, which is the Masters phase, allows you to work independently on the final stretch of your MA project. Individual tutorials support you, and are intended to help you keep on track with your project and focus on the standards required to achieve the Masters award. You will work towards your final assessment, but also produce examples of your work for the MA Exposition, a public event intended to celebrate the work and successes of our students throughout the year.