Middlebury Handbook

Master of Arts in Teaching Degree

The Master of Arts in Teaching degree leads to a secondary teaching license through the State of Vermont for teaching grades 7–12 with the endorsement for Modern Languages in either Arabic, Chinese, French, German, Hebrew, Italian, Japanese, Korean, or Spanish. This degree requires 12 units of course credit. One unit of Middlebury credit is normally equivalent to three credit-hours of study at institutions using the Carnegie credit hour system. 

Receipt of a bachelor’s degree or the equivalent from an accredited institution is a prerequisite for admission to the Master of Arts in Teaching program. Applicants are not required to have completed an undergraduate major or minor in the language of study. Students must have earned a minimum cumulative grade point average of 3.00 in their undergraduate coursework as well as a minimum 3.00 grade point average in their undergraduate major or minor if their undergraduate major or minor was in the primary language they are seeking the endorsement to teach. 

Due to evolving requirements for teacher credentialing, the Middlebury MAT degree must be earned within a five-year period following admission. All credit awarded in the MAT program expires after five years, whether the credit is earned at Middlebury or transferred from another institution. For example, credit earned in the 2025 Summer session will expire after the end of the 2030 Summer session. 

The validity of a degree, which certifies a level of achievement, does not expire. 

The validity of the teaching license itself is subject to state requirements for ongoing professional development and practice to maintain the validity of the teaching license. 

• Rules for maintaining the validity of the license in the state of Vermont can be found here: Rules Governing the Licensing of Educators_2024_MiddleburyLanguageSchoolsMAT.pdf
• If graduates seek to transfer their Vermont license to a jurisdiction outside of Vermont, they must submit proof of having earned their degree in addition to (in most jurisdictions) a copy of the initial Level 1 for the state of Vermont. Different jurisdictions have their own regulations about how long teacher licenses remain valid and the requirements for maintaining validity. Keeping track of these requirements is essential for a degree holder to remain in good standing in relation to the jurisdiction they are teaching in.

Credit and Course Load

(see Registration)

All credit awarded by the Language Schools is defined in terms of units. One unit equals three semester hours of credit. 

• Students enrolled in the Summer sessions within the Arabic, Chinese, French, German, Hebrew, Italian, Japanese, Korean, and Spanish Schools normally earn three units (equivalent to 9 semester-hours) of credit per summer. 
• Students enrolled in the online Fall and Spring semesters earn two units (equivalent to six semester-hours) of credit per online term.

Summer 1	Fall 1	Spring 1	Summer 2	Fall 2
Take three units in person in the summer Language Schools	Take two one-unit online asynchronous courses: Session A is the first seven weeks, Session B is the final seven weeks	Take two one-unit online asynchronous courses: Session A is the first seven weeks, Session B is the final seven weeks	Take three units in person in the summer Language Schools	Complete student teaching while taking one-and-a-half units of Student Teaching Practicum and a half unit of Licensure Portfolio online

 

The Language Schools advise against taking more than the three-unit load in the in-person Summer sessions, and the MAT Program advises against taking more than a two-unit load during the academic-year semesters. 

• Permission to take a fourth course during a Summer session must be obtained from the Director or Associate Director of both the School and the leadership of the MAT Program, is granted only in rare exceptions, and only to graduate students who have completed a previous summer or semester of study at the master’s level.
• Permission to carry more than the normal load of two courses per Fall 1 or Spring 1 semester is rarely granted and is only possible by petitioning the Dean of the Language Schools. As all other courses must be completed before the Fall 2 student teaching semester, it is not possible to be enrolled in more than the two required courses in Fall 2. 

Students are billed for extra courses after the beginning of the session (see Extra Course Fees). Payment in full is due upon receipt of the bill. 

MAT candidates must have earned the minimum passing grade of B- in all courses counting towards their MAT program to be eligible to enroll in the Fall 2 Student Teaching and Licensure Portfolio courses, which are the final courses in the program. 

If a candidate takes time off of the program, they will have to complete the courses they missed when they are offered again to be eligible to enroll in the Student Teaching and Licensure Portfolio courses. 

Withdrawals 

A student who chooses to withdraw from the MAT program may, with permission of the Director of the relevant Language School, still count any successfully completed Summer session courses toward a Middlebury MA degree in that language. Online academic year courses taught in English can not be counted towards an MA degree in place of any in-language summer course.

Withdrawal from individual courses in a Summer session follows the procedures outlined in the Academic Policies | Registration section. 

During the online Fall 1 and Spring 1 semesters, each semester is composed of a Session A course for the first seven weeks, and a Session B course for the remaining seven weeks. Per federal Title IV regulations, to remain enrolled in one of these courses, students must contribute a substantive assignment within the first week of each online course. After the first week of the course, Student Financial Services initiates the enrollment verification process to disburse financial aid. If a student does not participate before enrollment verification is initiated, the student will be administratively removed from their course(s) and their financial aid adjusted accordingly.  

Academic participation includes any point-earning activity in a class, including but not limited to posting to a discussion board, submitting an assignment, student-initiated contact with a faculty member to ask a question about a course topic, or submitting an exam or quiz. Activities that do not constitute academic participation include logging in to the Learning Management System, emailing the professor about grades, submitting a video introduction, discussing academic progress in the course or program, and communicating via email with an advisor, student financial services, or other administrative staff. 

The program strongly encourages students to complete both the Session A and Session B courses in each of the Fall 1 and Spring 1 semesters. Middlebury Language Schools financial aid* is awarded for the entire Fall or Spring semester based on the assumption that a student will take both courses in each semester. Withdrawing from a semester after completing only the Session A course will mean forfeiting the institutional financial aid awarded for the Session B course and may mean adjustments to financial aid awards in the year when students retake the Session B course. 

* Note: Federal financial aid has different refund rules. Students receiving federal financial aid should speak with the Office of Student Financial Services before withdrawing from a course. 

Students who complete a Session A course but withdraw from the subsequent Session B course must complete a withdrawal form and will still be responsible for completing that Session B course in a future semester in order to be eligible to take the Student Teaching Practicum and Portfolio classes. 

If a student voluntarily withdraws from a Middlebury MAT Fall 1 or Spring 1 term at any time after the academic Session A or Session B has begun, tuition shall be refunded as follows: Before the 11th day of the A academic session or the B academic session, a student will be eligible for 100% of tuition refunded or credited. After the 11th day of the academic Session A or the Session B, tuition will not be refunded or credited. 

During the Fall 2 term, students are simultaneously enrolled in a one-and-a-half unit Student Teaching course and a half-unit Licensure Portfolio course, which both run for the full 15 weeks. If a student is unable to complete both courses and must withdraw from one course, they are strongly advised to withdraw only from the Licensure Portfolio course (subject to the timelines and refund procedures above) but should complete the Student Teaching course to generate all the materials that they will eventually need. They must then reenroll in the Licensure Portfolio course in a subsequent Fall semester in order to successfully complete the program and to be recommended for the Vermont teaching license. Enrolling in a single course may affect eligibility for financial aid as described above. 

 

Eligibility for Secondary Teaching License 

To meet the requirements for the Vermont teaching license, candidate students must meet all of five requirements: 

1. Core Skills for Educators 

   Candidates must satisfy the English reading, English writing and mathematics requirements as required by the State of Vermont Agency of Education through either the Praxis Basic Skills (Formerly Praxis I) exam or one of the alternative measures specified as determined by the State of Vermont.

2. Language and Subject Matter Skills 

   Candidates must demonstrate language proficiency in two different ways:

   First, they must meet the Middlebury Language Schools MA program’s own requirements for their particular language of study in order to take the required graduate-level summer courses. 

   Second, candidates must satisfy the language proficiency requirement as stipulated by the state of Vermont Agency of Education. There are multiple measures for satisfying this requirement. The default means is through either the Praxis Subject Assessment (Chinese, Japanese, French, German, Spanish) or the equivalent ACTFL Oral Proficiency Interview (OPI) + Written Proficiency Test (WPT) exams (Italian, Hebrew, Arabic, Korean). Depending on the state that a candidate plans to teach in, students may take that state’s state-specific alternative test to the Praxis Subject Assessment. 

   Although the Middlebury Language Schools MA program proficiency requirements are generally higher than Vermont’s Praxis II or ACTFL OPI score requirements, candidates must complete both proficiency assessments. 

3. Satisfactory Completion of Coursework 

   A student must earn a grade of B- or better in any course counting toward the MAT degree. 

   Additionally, a student must earn a 3.00 average GPA both for their entire MAT program and also in the Student Teaching Practicum and Licensure Portfolio course in order to be eligible to receive the MAT degree and to be approved for the teaching license.

   Master of Arts in Teaching degree students who are assigned a grade of “F” will be dismissed from the program. All other failing grades (see Grades and Transcripts) represent unsatisfactory progress and may jeopardize a student’s eligibility for federal loans, and may be grounds for dismissal from the program. Transfer courses may not be used to make up failures (see Transfer Credit section below). 

   • All failed Summer session courses must be made up in a subsequent Summer session
   • All failed online courses (lower than a B-) must be made up in a subsequent Fall or Spring session. With special permission, this may be done as an independent study (see Independent Study Courses below)   

4. Student Teaching Placement

   The student teaching Placement requires candidates to teach daily full-time for 13 weeks in modern language classrooms with students in grades 7–12. The placement can be split between middle and high school classrooms, and can involve working in classrooms other than the language they are pursuing endorsement in, but they must spend at least part of the day teaching the language they are pursuing endorsement in. Updated responsibilities and procedures related to the student teaching placement are contained in the Student Teaching Handbook. 

5. Vermont Licensure Portfolio 

   To be recommended by Middlebury for the teaching license, candidates must also demonstrate their skills in ten core teaching competencies as outlined in the Vermont Licensure Portfolio. While completion of the portfolio is scaffolded throughout the coursework in the program, it is ultimately up to each candidate to ensure that the portfolio they hand in at the end of the program is of sufficient quality to meet Vermont’s requirements. The portfolio is scored by trained raters chosen by Middlebury Language Schools. Once the portfolio receives a passing score, the Middlebury Language Schools administration will inform the Vermont Agency of Education that the candidate is qualified for the Vermont teaching license, and the license will be mailed to the candidate.

   If all other test, course, and student teaching requirements have been completed, but the completed portfolio does not yet receive a passing grade at the end of their Fall 2 semester, students will receive a grade of incomplete in the Licensure Portfolio course and sign a contract acknowledging 1) what they must do to receive a passing score on the portfolio and 2) the exact date that they will submit the revisions by in order for revisions to be evaluated and the incomplete grade to be changed before the March graduation date. Only once the revised portfolio has been evaluated and received a passing score will the grade for the Licensure Portfolio course be changed from an incomplete, and will Middlebury Language Schools administration inform the Vermont Agency of Education that the candidate is qualified for the Vermont teaching license. A grade of “incomplete” that has not been resolved as passing by the March graduation date automatically becomes a failing grade and the student will have to retake the Licensure Portfolio course. Reminders of the deadline will not be sent by the Registrar’s Office.

 

Transfer Credit

After formal admission to the program, candidates for the MAT degrees may request permission from the leadership of the MAT Program to apply coursework from another Middlebury MA program that was not used toward a degree or may request permission to transfer coursework from another institution up to a maximum of the equivalent of one full-time summer of study at Middlebury (three units). 

Applying a course from Middlebury MA coursework

Courses applied to the MAT degree program from a previous Middlebury MA program should have been taken within five years prior to their admission to the MAT Program. 

The summer in-language component of the MAT curriculum consists of certain courses which must be taken. In two of these courses (an introductory teaching course and a culture and materials course) part of the Vermont Licensure Portfolio is completed. The four other courses include linguistics requirements from the MAT program and may include other basic skills requirements from specific language schools if the candidates do not test out of them. This means that not all courses from prior MA work, particularly some literary or cultural studies courses, may apply to the MAT curriculum. The decision on which courses can be transferred towards the MAT degree will be made jointly by the Director of each language school and the leadership of the MAT program. 

Transferring a course from another institution

Several conditions must all be met though for courses to be accepted for transfer from another institution:

• Courses for transfer must be at the graduate level and taken at an accredited institution that offers a Master of Arts degree in either the language of study or a related discipline. 
• Courses for transfer must have been taken within three years prior to their admission to the MAT program. 
• Courses for transfer must be valued at the equivalent of one unit of Middlebury credit (three semester hours, four and a half quarter hours, or six ECTS units). For courses taken at institutions on the quarter system, as well as institutions whose courses do not carry credit equaling three semester hours, the Middlebury Language Schools grant (a) one unit of credit for two quarter courses or (b) two units of credit for three quarter courses. Students need to submit in writing which option they intend to follow. 
• Courses for transfer cannot have counted towards any other degree which a student has already earned. 
• Courses for transfer must be taken on a graded, not a pass/fail or credit/no credit, basis. No grade below a B- may be applied toward a Middlebury MAT degree. 
• Courses may not be transferred to make up for courses failed at a Middlebury Summer session or during the academic year online. Students with failing grades in a Middlebury course forfeit as many possibilities of transfer credit as they have failing grades.
• All courses approved for transfer must have been completed by the end of the summer before their student teaching placement begins. 

Conditions which only apply to transferring in in-language courses in lieu of summer courses

Final approval will come from the Director of the relevant language school and the Registrar’s Office. 

A maximum of three units may be transferred to the MAT degree, including a maximum of two units which replace in-language summer courses, from prior graduate coursework which did not lead to a degree. 

• Courses normally approved for a transfer might not have included the preparation work intended for each course towards the Licensure Portfolio. If this is the case, the student may need to create a unit plan, lesson plans, or instructional materials on their own, in order to be poised to complete the Licensure Portfolio.  
• In-language courses for transfer in must be taught in the areas of language analysis and linguistics, culture and civilization, pedagogy, or professional preparation, and must not duplicate courses already taken at Middlebury for degree credit. The Director of the school for the teaching language must approve the syllabus to judge that it is indeed equivalent to a course offered through the Language Schools. 

Conditions which only apply to transferring in courses in lieu of online academic year courses

Final approval will come from the leadership of the MAT Program and the Registrar’s Office. 

As noted above, a maximum of three units may be transferred to the MAT degree, including a maximum of two units which replace in-language summer courses, from prior graduate coursework which did not lead to a degree. 

If transferring in a course from another institution will result in only one course being taken within an online semester, this may have consequences for financial aid and candidates should contact Student Financial Services before deciding to transfer in a course (see section on Withdrawals above).

• Under no circumstances can a student transfer a course to replace the Student Teaching and Licensure Portfolio courses. 
• As all online courses include preparation work toward at least one portfolio artifact, if a student transfers in a course which does not contain such preparatory work, the student may need to create any missing materials for the Licensure Portfolio on their own. 
• Courses taken at other institutions before admission to the program may be transferred toward the MAT degree, on the condition that the transferred courses must not have been and must not be in the future used toward any other degree. 
• For courses taken at other institutions after the first summer of study, written approval of a course’s transferability must be obtained from Middlebury before registering for that course. Courses that have not been pre-approved will be considered for transfer only in those instances in which a student can demonstrate that pre-approval was not possible (for example, due to a last minute cancellation of a pre-approved course). 

Independent Study Courses

If a student decides to take academic leave for a period, and returns to the program in a summer when a particular required MAT course is not being offered, that student may be offered the opportunity to make up that course by enrolling in an independent study, contingent on the availability of faculty to supervise an independent study course.  

A student seeking to apply an introduction to teaching methodology or materials and culture course to the MAT degree program which they had taken previously as a Middlebury MA student might not necessarily have completed required preparation work toward the Licensure Portfolio. Such students may need to create any missing materials on their own time without registering for an independent study course. In other words, a student can complete a draft of a curricular artifact on their own based on guidance from the state of Vermont provided by the MAT Program, but this work will not count as a course for which tuition is due. 

With special permission from the Dean of the Language Schools, failed online academic year courses (a grade of C+ or lower) may be made up in an independent study format in a subsequent online semester, even if this means that a student is taking more than the expected course load per online semester. The decision to allow an independent study to substitute for a failed course will be made based on available teaching resources, the candidate’s academic record, and the possibility of the candidate achieving the required 3.00 GPA by re-taking the course.