Master of Arts in International Relations (Mid-Career)

The Master of Arts in International Relations (IREL) is designed as a terminal MA program for mid-career students who wish to complete an advanced degree in order to further their career in the field of international relations. The program is designed for students who already have roughly seven years or more of work experience relevant to international affairs (some flexibility is permitted on the seven years benchmark). It is an abbreviated program which assumes that students already have a strong knowledge of the field and hence require less coursework than students who do not have substantive IR related work experience.

Prospective students who have already completed an MA in a related field, such as Political Science or History, but who do not have work experience in the IR field, may be permitted to apply to the Mid-Career program, at the discretion of the IR Department. Contact the Graduate Programs Administrator to inquire about this possibility.

Prospective students with little or no work experience in the field should apply for our two-year MA in International Affairs. Students who are unsure of which program to apply to should contact the Graduate Programs Administrator for assistance in making this determination.

Although the Mid-Career program can be completed in one academic year, most students spend three semesters (or two semesters and one summer term) in the department. Two semesters are devoted to completing the required coursework, statistics and language requirements, and the third semester or summer term is devoted to writing the MA paper.

In addition to being an excellent degree for those seeking careers in a civilian role, this program is also ideal for U.S. Army Officers who are required to complete a master’s program as part of their training in the Foreign Area Officer (FAO) program. Boston University is on the U.S. Army approved list of schools for Advanced Civil Schooling in Latin American studies, East and West European studies, Russian studies, East Asian studies, Middle Eastern studies and African Studies. Click here for more information for FAOs interested in studying at BU.

Requirements

Students must complete all IR core requirements, including the General Core Course, Foreign Language, Statistics, and MA Paper requirements. The program requires a total of eight courses (three core courses plus five elective courses) or the equivalent of 32 credits. To see a progress report for mid-career MA students, go to the forms page.

Students are encouraged, but not required, to develop an informal regional or functional concentration with three to four of their electives. Doing so is not a requirement of the degree and a concentration will not appear on university transcripts, but choosing a concentration does help to give greater focus and definition to a student’s program of study.

Students may complete the African Studies Certificate as a component of this degree.

Third-Term Rule

Normally, when students have completed all of their coursework, but still have other degree requirements (such as the MA Paper) unfinished, they pay to BU a Continuing Student Fee for each additional semester they spend in the program until all degree requirements have been fulfilled. Students in the mid-career IR MA program, and this program only, are permitted a special exemption to this standard procedure. If students in this program complete all degree requirements except for the MA Paper (coursework, statistics, language exam) by the end of their second semester in the program, they are permitted a third term to complete the MA paper for which they will not be charged the continuing student fee. This special exemption is called the Third Term Rule. Students exercising the Third Term Rule will be required to register at BU during their third term and will therefore be charged several minor fees (typically not exceeding $200 total).

In order to be eligible for the Third-Term Rule, students must complete the degree requirements by the end of the BU semester of their second term in the program. If, for example, a student takes a statistics course at another university during his second term in the program, and that course does not finish until after the BU semester finishes, that student is not eligible for the Third Term Rule.

Students who do not complete their MA Paper during their third term must register as a continuing student for the next term and will be charged the normal continuing student fee. Furthermore, such students will be retroactively charged the continuing student fee for their third term.

The Third-Term Rule applies to the Mid-Career MA in International Relations program only and is NOT applicable to any other degree program offered by the Department of International Relations. It does NOT apply to any of our joint or dual degree programs. Further, the Third-Term Rule is specific to the Boston campus and does not apply to students undertaking the program at the Brussels campus.