M.A. in Educational Administration

The Master of Arts in Educational Administration program qualifies candidates for a Certificate of Eligibility for the Preliminary Educational Administration Services credential (PASC). This program has a focus on K-12 education using a lens of cultural proficiency and equity.  Candidates also conduct meaningful field experience work in school settings.

Candidates develop skills and knowledge in all aspects of practice related to:

• Leading 21^st century instruction
• Creating a responsive environment and community
• Managing budget, legal issues, and personnel
• Understanding and responding to data
• Engaging in sound theoretical and practical leadership philosophies
• Developing a culture of continual school improvement

What makes this program unique:

• Earn the Master's Degree in just twelve months
• Join a cohort and experience the network of teacher-leaders, just like you, who want to advance their careers
• Engage in action research of your interest to impact your school site

This fully-online program is run through Extended Learning.

Full details are available on the Extended Learning program page.

• Faculty

  Dr. Brooke Soles grew up in rural Wisconsin where she attended public schools.  As an Associate Professor of Educational Administration and Leadership at the California State University San Marcos (CSUSM), she teaches courses in the M.A.Ed. and University of California, San Diego/CSUSM Joint Doctoral Program. She holds a B.A. in Spanish and Education from the University of Wisconsin, Platteville, a M.Ed. from the University of California, Los Angeles, and an Ed.D. in Educational Leadership from the University of California, Berkeley. Prior to higher education, Dr. Soles served for 15 years as K-12 bilingual teacher and administrator in the San Francisco and Los Angeles Unified School Districts (LAUSD) in both traditional public and charter schools primarily at the secondary level. She also served as a Los Angeles County Office of Education Charter School Office Authorizer. Dr. Soles completed service as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Honduras and board member of both the Los Angeles Neighborhood City Council and the Gay and Lesbian Administrators and Allies of the LAUSD. She currently serves on the board for the California Association of Professors of Education Administration. Her current scholarship interest includes culturally proficient educational practices, learning and teaching in educational leadership, and online teaching and learning.

  E-mail: bsoles@csusm.edu | Phone: 760-750-8284

  Manuel P. Vargas, PhD, is a teacher educator with nearly 40 years of experience in P-12 and higher education. He has taught 4th, 5th, 7th, and 8th grades and has been a K-8 assistant and school principal at International Baccalaureate (IB) American schools in Mexico. His career in higher education began in North Carolina where he initiated the middle-level educator preparation program for middle school teachers. Soon after, he became a departmental chair, associate dean, interim dean, and dean all positions in the School of Education and Human Performance at Winston-Salem State University, one of the sixteen campuses of the University of North Carolina System. His experience in higher education also includes two years at Sonoma State University, CA, in the multiple-subject program; one year at Appalachian State University, NC, as an associate professor of educational leadership; and an adjunct part-time position (Spanish instructor) at Salem College, NC. Dr. Vargas’s position as Director of the School of Education at Cal State San Marcos ended in 2015-16 AY. Upon conclusion of his administrative duties, he joined the Educational Administration program and the Joint Doctoral Program—the latter a collaborative effort between California State University, San Marcos and University of California, San Diego—where he teaches courses related to leadership and diversity, leadership and organizational change, and access to educational opportunities topics which he previously taught at Appalachian State and Sonoma State universities. His professional goals and scholarly activities focus on working with underrepresented groups in education, especially African American, Native American, and Latino students. He is the author of Navigating the American Education System: Four Latino Success Stories. He is concerned about public education, which seems to leave many children of color behind while others race to nowhere.  

  E-mail: mvargas@csusm.edu | Phone: (760) 750-4314  

  

  Audrey D. Paredes, Ph.D. is an assistant professor of educational leadership and administration in the School of Education at California State University, San Marcos (CSUSM). Her role as a teacher-scholar is informed by her positionality as the daughter of Guatemalan working-class immigrants, first-generation college student, and a former college student affairs practitioner. As an interdisciplinary scholar, Dr. Paredes’ broader research agenda utilizes critical approaches to understand and conceptualize the ways in which institutions of higher education, specifically Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs), can be sites of transformation so that systemically marginalized communities can thrive. Currently, her research focuses on responding to the heterogeneity of the Latina/o/x college student population within the context of federally designated Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSIs) by way of examining the lived experiences of Central American undergraduates. Dr. Paredes’ has expertise in anti-racist and decolonial theories such as Critical Race Theory and Chicana/Latina Feminist Theories as well as, Chicana/Latina Feminista qualitative methodologies. Recently, Dr. Paredes’ research has been published in the Journal of Latinos in Education and Journal of Hispanic Higher Education. Prior to joining CSUSM, she was the project manager for the University of California’s Hispanic Serving Institutions (UC-HSI) Initiative, and she has also served as a researcher for the Center for Critical Race Studies in Education at UCLA, a student affairs practitioner working with transfer students at Cal Poly Pomona, and project lead for the Ford Foundation funded UndocuScholars Project. Dr. Paredes earned her Ph.D. in education with a specialization in race and ethnic studies at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), MA in education at UCLA, and BA in Gender, Ethnicity, and Multicultural Studies (concentration in Chicana/o Studies) from California State Polytechnic University, Pomona.

  E-mail: aparedes@csusm.edu | Phone: (760) 750-8285

• Program Information & Courses
  You can find the information about the program on the course catalog.