<p>Hi all.</p>
<p>The way I have understood it, then an undergraduate program corresponds to a B.Sc., and a graduate program corresponds to a M.Sc. program. Is this correct?</p>
<p>Any help will be greatly appreciated.</p>
<p>Best regards,
Niles.</p>
<p>Graduate programs are programs that require (at least) a Bachelor’s degree for admission. That includes programs leading to a Master’s degree but also Doctoral programs, medical school, law school, etc. Undergraduate programs lead to a Bachelor’s or Associate’s degree or a certificate in the case of non-degree programs.</p>
<p>In the US many programs that internationals view undergraduate courses (just speaking of UK) - especially medicine and law are all graduate programs. I’m just speaking of UK programs. Also the US program takes 4 years.</p>
<p>In the UK many graduate programs in the US are undergraduates in the UK and many of them take 3 years to complete an undergraduate degree. Also UK programs are more ‘self-study’ compare to the US from what I have been hearing.</p>
<p>As already said, it depends on what you’re intending to study. For instance, in Europe, to study law, you just have to go through three years (bachelor’s degree) then add two more (master’s degree). In the US, you have to get an undergraduate degree before being able to get into a law school (for a graduate degree). Still, to get a degree in law, it’s basically longer, I guess, in the U.S. than in Europe. But there are other areas where you don’t really have to get a graduate degree in the US while in Europe, you’d still have to do a 3+2.</p>
<p>In the post-Bologna European system, you can get a bachelor’s degree in 3 years only, but those shorter degrees are normally not sufficient to get a job in certain areas like engineering for example. Most students stay 2 more years in school to get what in Bologna terminology is called a “master’s” degree. In practical terms, a new 3+2 master’s degree is basically the same as the older 5-year diplomas that existed in countries like Germany, Spain or Portugal prior to the Bologna agreement.</p>
<p>The UK is somewhat different in the sense that 3-year bachelor’s degrees were already the norm prior to Bologna and are still viewed, especially in arts/humanities/social sciences fields as a sufficient entry-level qualification for a (real) job. Also, it is possible in the UK to get a master’s degree in one year only, normally by completing a full-year (12-month) graduate program or an extended (4-year) undergraduate course. The latter option is the norm now in the UK for engineering and physical sciences students. Both in the UK and in continental Europe, once you get a master’s, there is the possibility to stay another 3-4 years in school to get a doctor’s degree. That is a research-based degree suitable for students who want to pursue careers in academia.</p>
<p>The U.S system on the other hand differs in many respects from both the European or British models. It normally takes 4 years to get a bachelor’s degree (B.A. or B.S.) in the US and undergraduate studies are less specialized than in Europe, meaning that students select one or two main areas of concentration (called “majors”), but take only a small number of classes in those areas (typically no more than 8-10 one-semester courses). The rest of their schedule is then filled with a “general education curriculum”, where humanities students for example are required to take science classes, and vice-versa. There are also lots of free elective classes, which students can use to pursue any area that may be of interest to them outside their majors, including the possibility of adding a “minor” to their diplomas. </p>
<p>With 1-2 additional years of study beyond a B.A/B.S, it is possible to get a master’s degree in the US. That may be a professional master’s (e.g. M.B.A, M.Eng), normally viewed as a terminal degree, or an academic master’s degree (M.S or M.A.), which is normally seen as the first step towards a research doctorate (normally called a Ph.D degree). In many schools, academic master’s and Ph.D programs are now integrated in the sense that the master’s degree is awarded “in cursum” as part of the successive requirements (e.g. coursework) that a Ph.D student has to fulfill to graduate. Integrated master’s/Ph.D program normally last 5-7 years beyond the B.S/B.A and tend to be more intense/go deeper than the 3-4 year doctorates in continental Europe and the UK.</p>
<p>Finally, as was already mentioned by other posters, some professions like law and medicine are peculiar in the sense that, in order to attend a law school or medical school in the US, one has to get a 4-year bachelor’s degree first. After three (in the case of law) or, in the case of medicine, 4 additional years of study, one graduates then with a first-professional degree , e.g. J.D. for law students or M.D. for medical students. Despite the “D” in their names, those are not research doctorates like a Ph.D. degree and, for international comparison purposes, are better described as second (i.e. graduate-entry) bachelor’s degrees.</p>
<p>Just as a comparison, in the UK for example, one can begin law or medicine studies as an undergrad, shortly after A-levels. The B.A in law, normally also called an LL.B., is just a standard 3-year bachelor’s degree, but it is not sufficient to practice law in England or Wales. In addition, an aspiring lawyer has to pursue up to two extra years of “vocational training” beyond the LL.B, including a practical apprenticeship under the supervision of a licensed lawyer. </p>
<p>UK Medical degrees on the other hand normally last 5-6 years, starting with a 3-year pre-clinical course and, then, 2-3 extra years of clinical training. Many medical students in the UK use the last year of the pre-clinical course to earn a first B.S. degree and then graduate from the clinical school with an additional M.B/B.Chir (bachelor of medicine and bachelor of surgery) degree.</p>