Education Studies Major

Goals for the Education Studies Major

Requirements for the Education Studies Major

Students are expected to complete nine units of coursework, six of which must be completed at Wellesley College. The major consists of three primary requirements: education core coursework, a capstone experience, and an additional suite of courses taken within the education department. Supplemental documents to assist students in planning a course of study can be found on the education department website.

Students must complete:

An education core course

Students majoring in education studies must take at least one of the following three core courses. Students can also choose to take more than one core course as part of their fulfillment of the Education Research and Theory course requirement. Students taking multiple core courses may take them in any sequence as none of the core courses have prerequisites. Each course can be a good starting point for a student interested in studying education. One way of illustrating the distinctions between the three core courses is that:

*Prior to the 2024-25 academic year, EDUC 216 was included in the core course grouping. Students who completed EDUC 216 may use the course as a core course. 

EDUC 120

Foundations of Education: An Introduction to the Major Themes, Controversies, and Theories in the Field

1.0

EDUC 214

Ecologies of Education: Youth, Family, Community, and Power

1.0

EDUC 215

Educational Inequality and Social Transformation in Schools

1.0


An education studies capstone experience

All education studies majors will be required to take a capstone experience, with guidance on the selection from their major advisor. Education capstone courses have a course number designation in the 330s. Students may choose from the following two options and must declare their intentions by the end of their junior year:

At least four and up to seven additional courses from the list of Education Research and Theory courses.

Students are required to take at least four additional Education Research and Theory courses to complete their major. These courses allow students to establish a foundation in the interdisciplinary study of education and develop an integrated understanding of educational policy, research, and practice.

Students may also select up to three Curriculum and Teaching courses (which focus on teaching methods and offer field-based experiences in classrooms) and/or three Education Electives courses.

Education Research and Theory Courses

AFR 205 / EDUC 205

Black Pedagogies in the Americas

1.0

AFR 227 / EDUC 227

Black Girlhood Studies

1.0

AMST 102Y / EDUC 102Y

First-Year Seminar: Lessons of Childhood: Representations of Difference in Children's Media

1.0

AMST 206 / EDUC 206

Abolitionist Study: Knowledge Production in US Prisons

1.0

CHEM 302 / EDUC 317

Seminar: Communicating and Teaching Chemistry

1.0

ECON 226 / EDUC 226

Economics of Education Policy

1.0

EDUC 116Y

First-Year Seminar: From Abbott Elementary to Waiting for Superman: Representing School and Society on the Big Screen

1.0

EDUC 120

Foundations of Education: An Introduction to Major Themes, Controversies, and Theories in the Field

1.0

EDUC 200

Theory and Practice in Early Childhood Care and Education

1.0

EDUC 201

Exceptional Learners: An Introduction to Special Education

1.0

EDUC 207 / SOC 207

Schools and Society

1.0

EDUC 213

Social and Emotional Learning and Development: Theoretically Informed Practice for K-12 Education

1.0

EDUC 214

Ecologies of Education: Youth, Family, Community, and Power

1.0

EDUC 215 / PEAC 215

Educational Inequality and Social Transformation in Schools

1.0

EDUC 216

Race, Class, and Ethnicity in Education Policy

1.0

EDUC 234

Children’s Literature: Fostering Agency, Equity, and Academic Success

1.0

EDUC 236

Race, Class, and Ethnicity in Education Policy

1.0

EDUC 239H / PHYS 239H

Physics Pedagogy in Practice

.50

EDUC 245

The Politics of Multilingualism in Schools

1.0

EDUC 252 / HIST 252

The Modern Black Freedom Struggle

1.0

EDUC 298H / PSYC 299H

Practicum in Child Development

.50

EDUC 308 / SOC 308

Children in Society

1.0

EDUC 313

Seminar: Social and Emotional Learning and Development: Theoretically Informed Practice for K-12 Education

1.0

EDUC 321 / PEAC 312 / SOC 312

Seminar: De-centering and Re-centering: Social Theory Across the Globe

1.0

EDUC 324 / PSYC 324

Adolescent Sexual Health Communication in the Real World

1.0

EDUC 328 / PSYC 322

Calderwood Seminar in Public Writing: Social Technologies and Adolescent Development

1.0

EDUC 334

Seminar: Ethnography in Education: Race, Migration, and Borders

1.0

EDUC 335

Seminar: Urban Education and Emancipatory Research

1.0

EDUC 336

Seminar: Theorizing Race in Educational Inquiry

1.0

EDUC 338

Seminar: Qualitative Inquiry and Research Design in Education

1.0

EDUC 339

Seminar: Critical Perspectives, Practice, and Reflection in Teaching and Curriculum

1.0

EDUC 380

Seminar: Advanced Research Methods in Education

1.0

POL4 311

Seminar: Grassroots Organizing

1.0

WRIT 114

Education in Philosophical Perspective

1.0

 Curriculum and Teaching Courses
 

EDUC 300

Teaching and Curriculum in Middle School and High School

1.0

EDUC 303

Practicum: Curriculum and Supervised Teaching

1.0

EDUC 325

Seminar: Educating English Language Learners

1.0

Education Electives 

AFR 105

Introduction to the Black Experience

1.0

AFR 206

African American History 1500-Present 

1.0

AFR 220

Black Studies at Wellesley and Beyond

1.0

AFR 249

From Mumbet to Michelle Obama: Black Women's History

1.0

AMST 121

Introduction to Ethnic Studies

1.0

AMST 151

Asian American Experience

1.0

AMST 152

Race, Ethnicity, and Politics in America

1.0

AMST 161

Introduction to Latina/o Studies

1.0

AMST 222 / PSYC 222

Asian American Psychology

1.0

AMST 225 / SOC 225

Urban Studies and Policy

1.0

AMST 251 / SOC 251

Racial Regimes in the United States and Beyond

1.0

AMST 246 / SOC 246

How Immigration is Changing the U.S. and the World

1.0

AMST 264

Histories of Asian American Labor and Immigration

1.0

AMST 281 / ENG 297

Rainbow Republic: American Queer Culture from Walt Whitman to Lady Gaga

1.0

AMST 290 / PEAC 290

Afro-Latinas/os in the U.S.

1.0

AMST 315

Beats, Rhymes, and Life: Hip-Hop Studies

1.0

ANTH 210

Political Anthropology

1.0

ANTH 231 / PEAC 231

Anthropology In and Of the City

1.0

CAMS 276

Media Publics: An Introduction to Civic Media

1.0

CLSC 216 / PSYC 216

Psychology of Language

1.0

CS 121 / MAS 121

Intro to Game Design

1.0

CS 232

Artificial Intelligence

1.0

ECON 241

Poverty and Inequality in Latin America

1.0

ECON 326

Seminar: Advanced Economics of Education

1.0

ECON 327

The Economics of Law, Policy and Inequality

1.0

ENGR 305 / PEAC 305

Intersections of Technology, Social Justice, and Conflict

1.0

HIST 203

Out of Many: American History to 1877

1.0

HIST 204

The United States History since 1865

1.0

HIST 253

Native America

1.0

LING 114

Introduction to Linguistics

1.0

LING 238

Sociolinguistics

1.0

LING 244

Language: Form and Meaning

1.0

LING 248

Introduction to Historical Linguistics

1.0

LING 312

Bilingualism: An Exploration of Language, Mind, and Culture

1.0

LING 338

Seminar: African American English

1.0

PEAC 104

Introduction to the Study of Conflict, Justice, and Peace

1.0

PEAC 206 / POL2 220

Qualitative Methods in the Social Sciences

1.0

POL1 328

Seminar: Immigration Politics

1.0

POL4 249

Neoliberalism and its Critics

1.0

POL1 337

Seminar: Race in American Politics

1.0

POL4 341

Beyond Prisons: Resistance, Reform, Abolition

1.0

PSYC 101

Introduction to Psychology

1.0

PSYC 207

Developmental Psychology

1.0

PSYC 210

Social Psychology

1.0

PSYC 217

Cognition

1.0

PSYC 245

Cultural Psychology

1.0

PSYC 307R

Research Methods in Developmental Psychology

1.0

PSYC 316

Seminar: Language Acquisition

1.0

PSYC 325

Seminar: Adolescent Psychology: Bridging Research and Practice

1.0

PSYC 326

Seminar: Child and Adolescent Psychopathology

1.0

PSYC 333

Clinical and Educational Assessments

1.0

PSYC 337

Seminar: Prejudice and Discrimination

1.0

PSYC 344

Seminar: Social Imagination

1.0

PSYC 345

Seminar: Development of a Theory of Mind

1.0

SAS 232 / SOC 232

South Asian Diasporas

1.0

SOC 205 / WGST 211

Modern Families and Social Inequalities: Private Lives and Public Policies

1.0

SOC 209

Social Inequality

1.0

SOC 311 / WGST 311

Seminar: Family and Gender Studies

1.0

WGST 221

Gender, Race, and the Carceral State

1.0

WGST 224

Feminist Methods

1.0

WGST 326

Seminar: Crossing the Border(s): Narratives of Transgression

1.0

WRIT 110

The Social Construction of Inequalities: Race, Gender, Class and Sexuality

1.0

MIT EC. 717

D-Lab: Education and Learning

0.75

MIT 11.124

Introduction to Education: Looking Forward and Looking Back on Education

0.75

MIT 11.125

Introduction to Education: Understanding and Evaluating Education

0.75

Additional Considerations to the Education Studies Major:

Beyond the requirements described above:

Honors in Education Studies

The only route to honors in the major is writing a thesis and passing an oral defense of the thesis. To be admitted to the thesis program, a student must have a grade point average of at least 3.5 in all work in the major field above the 100 level; the department may petition on the student’s behalf if the student’s GPA in the major is between 3.0 and 3.5. See Academic Distinctions.

Advanced Placement Policy in Education Studies

Students may not count AP credits toward the fulfillment of the education studies major, education studies minor, or teaching and learning studies minor.