Most graduate programs are mainstream. You know -- stuff like business, math, or thermomolecular hydroponics. Fortunately, a few brave students take the road less traveled. Here are just a few examples of unusual forms of higher education (notice we didn't say "weird").
Arkansas State University offers baton wavers a master's degree in Music Conducting. The Santa Barbara Graduate Institute offers a Ph.D in somatic psychology. Several universities offer degrees in something called "Industrial Hygiene." Although its name reminds us of 6th-grade Health class, the program actually focuses on environmental issues.
Clemson and Michigan State University have programs in "packaging science." Who knew assembling boxes required a graduate degree? For those who long to study the romantic lives of farm animals, Mississippi State teaches animal husbandry. And if your dream is to be the next Stan Lee, you can go for a degree in comics. (Tougher than it sounds, we're sure.)
So there ya have it -- if you can imagine it, odds are you can find a school to give you a degree in it. Whether it will lead to a job is another matter.
Internationally, we have, for years now, seen the increase in the more vocational types of postgraduate programmes, particularly at the masters level. Universities in countries all over the world have expanded the number of dedicated postgraduate qualifications in the fields of management, finance, business and law, in response to student demand and the demands of the global economy. As wholesale government subsidies reduce for higher education around the world, institutions of all types are having to think, in many cases for the first time, about developing and teaching programmes that are both intellectually valid and attractive to students. In a sector that has traditionally been determined to remain producer driven, this is quite some turnaround to cope with in university academic committees all over the world.
So what is the most unusual masters degree available? With over 250,000 postgraduate programmes available in Europe alone, some taught in English, some not, that is an almost impossible question to answer. Certainly the growth of academic areas such as media and cultural studies have fuelled a whole host of unusual masters degrees in many countries, but these are by no means the only areas where the unusual of five years ago have almost become commonplace today.
