What can I do with a master’s in special education?

If you want to earn top salaries in special education jobs, one of the best ways to do so is to earn your special education master’s degree. Depending on your school district, an advanced degree will likely equal a salary range.

But earning more money isn’t the only reason students pursue a special education master’s degree, according to Dr. Joseph Johnson, Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Teacher Education at Troy University. Wanting to improve their teaching skills to help their students be more successful drives many back into the classroom, he says.

“The student population doesn’t change from just having a bachelor’s degree to having a master’s,” says Dr. Johnson. “You’re still going to develop skills to work with students with disabilities, but everything is going to be at a higher level as a graduate student. You spend a lot more time looking at the actual research behind these strategies. You go deeper into special education jurisprudence.”

While it’s not unusual for undergraduates to go directly into graduate-level co-op programs like TROY’s, he recommends that students work in special education jobs first.

“When they then come back to school and start working on their special education master’s degree and take a master’s degree in special education law, it is so much more eye-opening and more, Oh, I see now,” he says. “Achieving the master’s degree in special education, then, is not only driven by finances, but by a desire to maximize their ability to help students by being the strong, positive influence. It increases exponentially when you have the better understanding of what remains effective practice and what evidence-based practices exist for the students.”

Expand your teaching career options with a special education master’s degree

TROY’s graduate-level cooperative education programs can also be valuable for teachers who have a bachelor’s degree in elementary education. Kay-Anne Cornelia Blalock Morgan got one bachelor’s degree in basic education before they serve her master’s degree in special education at TROY in 2016. The former elementary school teacher is now a special education teacher at Ashford High School in Alabama’s Houston County School District.

“I enjoy working with the students the most,” she notes. “I know I’m making a huge impact on them every day. I’m helping them not only with their schoolwork, but with skills that will impact them in the real world after graduation.”

TROY prepared her for her teaching role by providing multiple field experiences in a variety of school districts, she says.

“No school is the same,” she explains. “TROY allowed me to enter many different types of schools to prepare me to work with a wide variety of students. I learned that a student is never a special needs student, but always a special needs student.”

As TROY alumni like Blalock Morgan can attest, earning a special education master’s degree makes you more marketable for general education and special education jobs.

Dr. Johnson says, “It gives them a few more choices in terms of their future careers.”

In states like Alabama, earning your master’s in special education gives you a pay raise—even if you choose not to teach special education. “It’s based solely on the fact that you have a higher level of understanding of serving students with disabilities in your regular classrooms,” explains Dr. Johnson.

In addition to classroom instruction, graduate-level cooperative educations can also open doors to specialist roles in school districts, he adds. A TROY graduate, for example, became a behavior intervention specialist for their school district.

“Depending on the needs of your school district and your own personal abilities and what you’re applying to, you’ll have more administrative opportunities with the special education master’s degree,” he says.

TROY’s cooperative education programs attract teachers and non-teachers alike

Teachers with licensure and advanced degrees in special education are in high demand in Alabama, the Southeast and across the country, notes Dr. Johnson. To help fill special education jobs, TROY offers two paths to earning your special education master’s degree.

If you have no teaching experience, you will enroll in TROY’s Collaborative K-6 or 6-12 (Special Education) Alternative-A Program. As part of this master’s program, you will learn alongside an experienced special education teacher during a one-semester teaching internship.

“Alternative A is for people with an education outside education. It could be business, marketing, communications, social work, law enforcement – their bachelor’s degree is just not in education,” explains Dr. Johnson. The program prepares them to pass the necessary tests they need for student teaching. During student teaching, students must complete their edTPA, the assessment used by teacher preparation programs across the United States

If you already have a teaching certificate, you choose TROY’s traditional option for the cooperative educations. Students in this master’s program have typically completed a traditional undergraduate teacher preparation program.

“The biggest difference between the two collaborative programs is the semester of student teaching they do as part of the Alt-A program,” adds Dr. Johnson.

Get your master’s degree in special education in less than two years

While he has had students complete TROY’s Collaborative 6-12 (Special Education) Alternative-A program in as little as 18 months, the average time to completion — because of the internship requirement — is about two years, says Dr. Johnson. He adds that the traditional education can be completed in a shorter time – 15 months on average.

Taking the time to obtain a master’s degree in special education is worth it, says Dr. Johnson.

“I don’t know that you would ever be able to fully maximize your potential if you didn’t get into some of the higher level courses,” he says. “I think if you didn’t go after your master’s degree, it would limit you professionally.”

Obtaining his master’s degree in special education made it possible for Dr. Johnson to change the direction of his career. He started as a social studies teacher and in 2002 began teaching special education after a former teacher turned principal approached him about an opportunity. He then earned an MS in Special Education from the University of Nebraska-Omaha and a Ph.D. in Special Education at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Since 2014, he has been preparing TROY graduates to succeed in special education jobs.

“Getting my special education master’s degree helped me,” he notes. “It improved my lateral thinking, as it helped me to have a broader view and a greater understanding of the whole of the subject and the long-term effects I was supposed to have. I had not properly taken into account everything I had to do for the high school students with disabilities. My focus was way too much on getting them to pass, say, a test, when the real true mission is, ‘What am I doing to set them up for success when they graduate?’

A graduate course that focused on tradition prepared him to “always look down the road and make the connection between what you’re working with as a skill set and how it will serve the student as a lifelong skill,” he says. “It was eye-opening for me. I know that the master’s program helped me understand it on a much higher level.”

In contrast to other cooperative educations, says Dr. Johnson that TROY includes 15 graduate credits focused solely on special education.

“They are geared toward advancing a student’s skill set, knowledge base, and special education topics, content, and practice,” he says. “What really sets our programs apart is that we’ve designed them to be as practical and evidence-based as possible to help our students become truly strong special education teachers.”

Learn more about TROY’s cooperative education programs

If you are interested in learning more about the Collaborative K-6 or 6-12 (Special Education) Alternative-A program or traditional cooperative education programs at TROY, please explore our master’s degree in special education program now.