can someone explain masters degrees to me please?

[IShallWearMidnight]

I was under the impression that you did a bachelors degree (BA/BSc), then a masters was something you did after that for 2 years or so. I did know about the MMath (which is a 4 year masters-as-a-first-degree) but thought that was a one of.

DD1 now tells me that loads of subjects now offer a 4 year masters-as-first-degree, and that's now the norm for bright students. Is that right, or just in her (maths/science) circle? I'm sure I've read on here about people going on to do masters as a postgrad.

At some universities (eg Edinburgh) you can do a masters as a first degree. Usually though you'd do a BA/BSc first and then a 1yr full time/2yrs part time MA/MSc afterwards if you want to.

I thought the increased popularity of masters as first degrees was to do with funding - there are no student loans available for a stand alone masters but a four year MMath, MBioSci or whatever still falls under the loans system.

I thought they were for people who couldn't find a job after graduating

at ggirl.

So I am right in that it's not especially usual, and only just a recent thing?

Some older universities still call their BA programmes masters especially in Scotland where the degrees are four years. Edinburgh, Glasgow and I think St Andrews do this. Oxford as well - my husband did his undergrad there and had the option of paying GBP100 to upgrade it to a Masters!!!! (he didnt bother)

What webwiz says.
Masters as first degrees are becoming increasingly common, mainly for science subjects.

Alive
The Oxford and Cambridge MAs are completely different to the 4 year masters courses. Just token bits of paper to confuse people.

The masters as a first degree at Edinburgh are five year courses though, so that's just the same as doing your four years and then a masters anyway

There's going to be a big difference between science and arts, imo.

As far as I can understand it, in science subjects you are trained in research techniques as part of your degree. That is to say, once you have a degree, you can frequently go on to a PhD without a Masters. I know nothing about science so I am relying on what people have told me here.

In arts, a degree is all well and good but you don't generally know enough about any one subject to be ready for a PhD. So you take a masters to learn the specific research techniques for a PhD, or to specialise in a subject area.

For example, after a history degree you could take a specialised masters and then go on to work in a museum. I have a languages degree and am taking a masters in medieval literature, where I will learn enough Latin, codicology, paelography etc to enable me to do my PhD.

I think it's more common in the sciences to be able to do a 4 year Masters as first degree. I have an MSci which I got 5 years ago in Physics, and it was quite common for Universities to put the majority of the students on the 4 year course, then have them decide at the end of 2nd year if they want to stay on it or move to the BSci instead - I think you had to have got a certain result in 2nd year to be able to stay on the MSci. I don't think it worked that way for the arts.

that all makes a bit more sense now, thanks everyone.