University of Arkansas at Little Rock

Goals

The primary goals of the M.A. program in Liberal Studies are to:
1. Make students aware of the defining features or assumptions behind the division of human inquiry into the major academic disciplines.
2. Convey the limitations that may accompany treatment of an issue from only one disciplinary perspective.
3. Provide students with the research, analytic, synthetic, and communication skills required to engage in multi and/or inter-disciplinary study, including the ability to:
   1. clearly identify and frame a problem,
   2. gather, retrieve, and organize relevant data,
   3. analyze and synthesize the relevant data, and
   4. effectively communicate the results of one’s research to others.

Learning Objectives

A graduate of the M.A. program in Liberal Studies should be able to:
1. Articulate, evaluate and critique the features or assumptions that define two of the academic disciplines in which the student has chosen to pursue graduate study (Goal 1).
2. Clearly define an interdisciplinary research project and explain its significance (Goal 3A).
3. Explain why this issue or problem needs be, or is best addressed in, an interdisciplinary manner (Goal 2).
4. Propose an interdisciplinary perspective or resolution that is backed by relevant data from at least two different disciplines (Goal 3B);
5. Cogently argue, using interdisciplinary methodology, for this perspective or resolution (Goal 3C); and
6. Effectively communicate this perspective or resolution to an audience of peers (Goal 3D).