Community, Engagement, and Belonging MASc

Find out more about our MASc in Community, Engagement, and Belonging.

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P-LA9Z

MASc (Master of Arts and Science)

1 year full-time

23 September 2024

Liberal ArtsLink opens in a new window

University of Warwick

How can we truly belong in a global community? On this innovative MASc degree students will cross disciplines to explore what it means to create purposeful change within local and global communities. Students will have the flexibility to shape the course around their own interests and career goals, while developing their research skills and expertise in community engagement.

This taught MASc in Community, Engagement, and Belonging is offered by the Liberal Arts Department in partnership with the Warwick Institute of EngagementLink opens in a new window. This unique, transdisciplinary course is designed to help students develop as future intellectual leaders, bringing together sites of knowledge creation (such as universities, think tanks, and industry) and global communities.

The core modules on this course focus on the value of building and enhancing partnerships with community organisations. They will help students to critically reflect on where, why, and how to bridge the gap between knowledge creation and communities, creating spaces for dialogue and innovation. Crucially, the core modules offer the methodological and theoretical grounding for in-depth research. This course also offers students the freedom to choose optional modules from across the University, enabling students to tailor the degree to suit their own intellectual passions, interests, and ambitions. In the Liberal Arts Department, we have extensive experience and resources in place to help students find modules from across the University that align with the issues of community engagement that matter to them most.

This course culminates in an intensive project focused on the creation of original, evidence-based, interdisciplinary, and embedded knowledge; students can choose either a Research Dissertation or a Community-Based Learning Dissertation. This flexibility empowers students to develop a project most aligned to their intellectual interests and/or career goals. The Research Dissertation allows students to use interdisciplinary approaches to produce original knowledge in a topic or case study related to Community, Engagement, and/or Belonging from any period or area. The Community-Based Learning Dissertation focuses on critical engagement with embedded knowledge in the form of a community project, undertaken with a community partner. If students choose this option, they will also be supported by our dedicated Employability and Placement Manager and ​will have the opportunity to apply for an experienced mentor from the Warwick Institute of Engagement. In both cases, students will have a dedicated dissertation supervisor assigned to them in the Liberal Arts department who will mentor them and help their project reach its full potential.

Graduates from this course will emerge as leaders in interdisciplinary community engagement. They will take their next steps with a deeper understanding and broader appreciation of the value of making a difference in local and regional communities.

Interested in learning more and taking the first step to making a real difference in your community? Sign up for updatesLink opens in a new window and get in touch with us at LiberalArts at warwick dot ac dot uk.

Who is this programme for?

This programme is ideal for you if you would like to pursue questions of belonging, engagement, and how knowledge production relates to communities from the local to the global. It is also appropriate for those who are keen to work within and alongside community projects, local government, heritage organisations, the charity sector, and other key organisations that interface between knowledge creation sites and communities. The programme is also ideal for those who wish to facilitate greater inclusion of community voices within research institutions and other sites of knowledge creation. We particularly welcome students with prior experience of interdisciplinary learning.

We also welcome mature students and those who have already obtained a postgraduate qualification (such as another MA or PhD), who are seeking to hone their expertise in community engagement and bring their rich experience to bear on these topics. Alternatively, potential students might already be working in a relevant sector and wish to gain a deeper understanding of community engagement and methodological approaches, including by studying their own knowledge-creation institution or community.

Skills from this degree

During this degree, students will develop the ability to:

• Critically and creatively evaluate issues of community engagement, citizenship, well-being, and belonging, while demonstrating advanced scholarship in an interdisciplinary context.
• Demonstrate and evidence a comprehensive understanding of transdisciplinarity and mixed methods in research design.
• Exhibit mastery in the exercise of transferable research skills and in community engagement theories and methods.
• Take a proactive and self-reflective role in developing research and community engagement skills.
• Demonstrate in-depth, specialist knowledge and mastery of techniques relevant for research and engagement.

Teaching and learning on this course take place across different disciplines, while also engaging with non-academic partners to bridge the gap between sites of knowledge creation and communities. This is reflected in the distinctive award for this degree: MASc (Master of Arts and Science), encapsulating the inter- and transdisciplinary nature of this programme.

We pride ourselves on a pedagogy of Problem-Based Learning. Students will be taught key course content via interactive lectures and task-guided reading. However, most learning will be through the active, authentic and applied student-self-construction of knowledge. This approach to teaching allows students to develop applied process skills and academic subject content at the same time.

Core modules on this course will be taught mainly by staff from the Liberal Arts Department who are passionate about the civic and interdisciplinary tradition of liberal education and experts in the delivery of interdisciplinary, research-led teaching and learning.

We aim to keep the class sizes for core modules on this course small (around 5-10 students), allowing teaching to be tailored to students’ interests.

In the first term, students will spend six hours each week participating in interactive seminars for their core modules. In the second and third terms, contact hours will depend on the options selected.

Students on this course will be assessed by a variety of methods, linked to practical applications. All assessments in modules offered by the School for Cross-faculty Studies link to practical applications. In these modules, students will complete formative and summative assessments. Formative assessments will include discussion circles mirroring professional discussions in the working world. In the summative assessments, students will have the opportunity to show subject expertise, while continuing to develop process skills.

Your timetable

Your personalised timetable will be complete when you are registered for all modules, core and optional, and you have been allocated to your lecture, seminar, and other study groups. Your core modules will be registered for you, and you will be able to choose your optional modules when you join us.

2:1 undergraduate degree (or equivalent). Find out more about our requirementsLink opens in a new window.

We welcome students from different backgrounds and experiences, and particularly those with a strong interest in community engagement and studying across disciplines.

In certain circumstances, we will consider applicants with a lower second-class honours degree, or a normal degree (and their equivalents). This is particularly the case for applicants with relevant professional experience which can be explicitly and directly related to our curriculum.

• Band B
• Overall IELTS (Academic, UKVI or Online) score of 7.0 and minimum component scores of two at 6.0/6.5 and the rest at 7.0 or above.

There are no additional requirements for this course.

The core modules on this course will allow students to come to their own understanding of how we belong in our communities, how to conduct meaningful research around topics related to community engagement, and critically reflect on the duties and responsibilities that we all share both as creators of knowledge and members of overlapping communities. The civic focus of this degree will empower students to think in a rigorous, evidence-based, interdisciplinary manner to transform our complex world.

Term One

The Good Life: Flourishing and Belonging within Communities

What does it mean to live a ‘Good Life’? How can personal development improve our communities? Can we lead a meaningful life if we set aside our responsibilities to each other? These questions sit at the heart of a liberal education.

This two-term module will critically examine the concept of engaged citizenship within communities across time periods, cultures, and disciplinary perspectives. Using a combination of case studies, primary sources, and hands-on workshops, students will be trained to understand and navigate complex interdisciplinary questions. Assessments for this module will be dynamic and student-driven, providing an opportunity to apply theories, models of practice, and research skills from other core modules.

Read more about The Good Life: Flourishing and Belonging within Communities moduleLink opens in a new window.

Creating Knowledge for Change: Foundations of Transdisciplinary Approaches

How can we use and combine different research methods for problem-solving and change-making? In this module, students will engage with the methodologies that underpin interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research. Covering quantitative, qualitative, and mixed-methods research, students will develop a core toolkit of research skills that they can apply to their future projects. An element of the assessment for this module will be to develop a mixed-methods research project plan, including application for ethical approval.

Read more about the Creating Knowledge for Change: Foundations of Transdisciplinary Approaches moduleLink opens in a new window.

Theory and Practice for Community Engagement

This module is designed to help students understand how to build and enhance partnerships between organisations. Students will have opportunities to examine and understand the relationships between knowledge production organisations—such as universities, think tanks, or research and development bodies—and community-based organisations in a range of contexts, from the local to the global.

Read more about the Theory and Practice for Community Engagement moduleLink opens in a new window.

Term Two

The Good Life: Flourishing and Belonging within Communities 

Continued from Term One (please see above).

Term Three

Choose one of two intensive knowledge-creation projects, to suit your intellectual passions and career aspirations:

Research Dissertation

Liberal Arts staff will provide bespoke support and mentorship for students as they apply their skills and knowledge of interdisciplinary methodologies to original knowledge creation in the form of a transdisciplinary research project. The focus of the project can be on any area, time period, or case study that aligns with the themes of belonging, community engagement, and the dialogue between communities and sites of knowledge creation (broadly defined). Students will publicly present their work to a community of relevant stakeholders, embedding their own knowledge creation within a community context.

Read more about the Research DissertationLink opens in a new window.

Community-Based Learning Dissertation

Liberal Arts staff will provide bespoke support and mentorship for students as they apply their skills and knowledge of interdisciplinary methodologies and public engagement to an embedded form of knowledge creation; the project will be undertaken with a community partner and students will produce a critical reflection on their work. The project will also be supported by our Employability and Placement Manager and students will have the opportunity to apply for an experienced mentor from the Warwick Institute of Engagement.

Read more about the Community-Based Learning DissertationLink opens in a new window.

In Term Two, students will have the opportunity to explore a variety of optional modules both within the School for Cross-faculty Studies and across other departments. This flexibility will enable students to tailor their degree to their own intellectual passions, interests, and/or career goals. Staff in the Liberal Arts Department have extensive expertise in helping students choose the best optional modules to design a unique degree that suits their interests and students on this degree will benefit from such bespoke support throughout. Students who opt for the Community-Based Learning Dissertation will be encouraged to consider the Warwick Institute of Engagement’s intensive postgraduate module on Public EngagementLink opens in a new window as one of their optional modules ​(dependent on availability).

Example optional modules from across the University may include:

• Health and well-being across the life courseLink opens in a new window
• Popular Movements and Sustainable ChangeLink opens in a new window
• Sustainable Urbanisation: from Risk to ResilienceLink opens in a new window
• Care-ful Sustainability: Place, Culture and ValueLink opens in a new window
• Critical Perspectives on business and global sustainable developmentLink opens in a new window
• Topics in Philosophy and the ArtsLink opens in a new window
• Cultural EntrepreneurshipLink opens in a new window
• Managing Cultural OrganisationsLink opens in a new window
• Socially Engaged Performance: Interventions and ProvocationsLink opens in a new window
• Fundamentals of World LiteratureLink opens in a new window
• Critical Theory, Culture, ResistanceLink opens in a new window
• Education and SocietyLink opens in a new window
• Leading Educational Change and ImprovementLink opens in a new window
• Civil Society and ActivismLink opens in a new window
• Global Law and PoliticsLink opens in a new window
• Approaching Ancient Visual and Material CultureLink opens in a new window

Please note, optional modules are subject to availability and offerings may change each year to keep students’ learning experience current and up to date. Students will also need to discuss their optional module choices with their personal tutor and receive approval from the Director of Graduate Studies in the Liberal Arts Department.