The goal of the Music Education Division is to educate students to be critically aware, community oriented and reflective persons who are professionally prepared to be transformative leaders in the education of a musical society. To accomplish this:

• We seek to be teachers who exemplify this goal;
• We select students who identify with this goal and have potential to achieve it;
• We develop safe, caring, and nurturing relationships with our students;
• We create and encourage educative experiences that contribute to and require evidence of this goal;
• We lead students to actively engage contemporary issues and trends in music education locally, nationally, and internationally.

Program Requirements

The PhD program in Music Education may be completed as a full-time program or a flexible-time program.

Full Time PhD Option

6.0 full-course equivalents (FCE) including:

At least 2.0 FCE (including MUS 2995Y Music Education Doctoral Research Project) must be taken from the departmental offerings in music education.

The balance of the student’s required program must be approved by the department and may include courses from the MA/MMus/PhD/DMA list and/or from another graduate unit.

At the department’s discretion, the student may receive credit for up to 3.0 FCE from an acceptable master’s degree program.

Students must be registered full time, on campus for a minimum of two years, in order to be in such geographical proximity as to be able to participate fully in the department's activities associated with the program.

Language requirements, if any, will be established by the student's advisory committee, based on specific research needs.

As early as possible in year 2, the student will submit a thesis proposal which must be approved by the end of that year. On approval of the proposal by the Music Education division of the department, a principal advisor and an advisory committee of at least three members (including the advisor as chair) will be appointed. The committee will meet with the student at least two times each academic year.

Upon successful completion of the comprehensive examination, the candidate proceeds to complete an oral defence of the thesis proposal, a thesis, and an oral defence of the thesis.

The PhD program in Music Education may be completed as a full-time program or a flexible-time program. Both programs begin in September. We have ONE admissions cycle per year.