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Experience the Santa Clara Difference
Our vision imagines a region and world in which everyone has access to an inspiring education and the psychological tools and support to propel them toward flourishing lives of meaning, purpose and connection. Our education is characterized by strong values, social justice, transformative education and a diverse community.
Driven by its mission to serve local Catholic schools, Santa Clara University’s School of Education and Counseling Psychology (ECP) proudly announces the Catholic Masters of Arts in Teaching (CatMAT) program, a two-year Master of Arts in Teaching specifically designed for current Catholic school teachers.
Program Qualities
In recognition of the substantial service Catholic school teachers commit to the Diocese of San Jose and the Church more broadly, ECP grants all CatMAT students a 50% discount on the current graduate student tuition rate.
Each CatMAT student joins and takes courses with a cohort of other Catholic school teachers. These cohorts function to encourage collaboration, community, and learning among teachers serving in various schools across the Diocese. To help build the mutual support and fellowship at the core of cohorts, ECP invites CatMAT students to attend multiple retreats and other community events across both years of the program.
In addition to earning a Master of Arts in Teaching, CatMAT students also fulfill the coursework required to apply for a California state teaching credential. CatMAT students are eligible to pursue a multiple-subject credential for teaching in elementary (K-5) classrooms, or a single-subject credential for teaching mathematics, social studies, science, or English language arts in secondary (6-12) classrooms.
CatMAT students take courses designed and sequenced particularly for Catholic school teachers. Because CatMAT students teach full-time during the school year, the bulk of their ECP courses are taken over the summer months. In their first summer, CatMAT student take introductory courses that provide the practical knowledge essential to establishing and managing a welcoming, learning-centered classroom environment. In their second summer, students take foundational courses that offer the theoretical knowledge necessary for addressing the social, cognitive, and linguistic factors mediating classroom teaching. Courses taught across both summers will consist exclusively of Catholic school teachers and will offer a distinctively Catholic perspective on this pedagogical content. Given the demands of full-time teaching during the academic year, during fall, winter, and spring quarters, CatMAT students take only 1-2 methods courses, which teach the particular pedagogical approaches and strategies for specific subject areas and which may also enroll students from other teacher programs in ECP.