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Academic Degree
It is any of a wide range of status levels conferred by institutions of higher education, such as universities, normally as the result of successfully completing a program of study.
As with other professions, teaching in universities was only carried out by people who were properly qualified. In the same way that a carpenter would attain the status of master carpenter when fully qualified by his guild, a teacher would become a master when he had been licensed by his profession, the teaching guild.
Candidates who had completed three or four years of study in the prescribed texts of the trivium (grammar, rhetoric, and logic), and who had successfully passed examinations held by their masters, would be admitted to a bachelor's degree. Thus a degree was only a step on the way to becoming a fully-qualified master – hence the English word "graduate", which is based on the Latin gradus ("step").
Today the terms "master", "doctor", and "professor" signify different levels of academic achievement, but initially they were equivalent terms. The University of Bologna in Italy, regarded as the oldest university in Europe, was the first institution to confer the degree of Doctor in Civil Law in the late 12th century; it also conferred similar degrees in other subjects including medicine. Note that medicine is now the only field in which the term "doctor" is applied, albeit informally, to students who have only obtained their first academic qualification.
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The naming of degrees eventually became linked with the subjects studied. Scholars in the faculties of arts or grammar became known as "masters", but those in philosophy, medicine, and law were known as "doctor". As study in the arts or in grammar was a necessary prerequisite to study in subjects such as philosophy, medicine and law, the degree of doctor assumed a higher status than the master's degree. This led to the modern hierarchy in which the Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) is a more advanced degree than the Master of Arts (M.A.). The practice of using the term doctor for all advanced degrees developed within German universities and spread across the academic world.
Types of academic degrees:
Some examples of specific degrees follow each general term. For more information, see the article about the general term.
Associate's degrees (U.S.): AA, ABS, AS, AAS
Foundation degrees (U.K.): FdA, FdEd, FdEng, FdMus, FdSc, FdTech
Bachelor's degrees: BA or AB , BBus, BCom or BComm, BE or BEng, BS or BSc or SB, BFA, BCL, LLB, BM or MB, BBA, MB BChir or MB ChB or MBBS, BSSc
Master's degrees: MA, MS or MSc, MSt, J.D.[1], MALD, MApol, MPhil, MRes, MFA, MTh, MTS, M.Div., MIA, MBA, MPA, MSW, MPAff, MLIS, MLitt, MPH, MPM, MPP, MPT, MRE, LLM, MEng, MSci, MBiochem, MChem, MPhys, MMath, MMus, MESci, MGeol, MTCM, MSSc, BCL[2] (Oxon), BPhil[2] (Oxon).
Specialist degrees: EdS, B.Acc., C.A.S.,
Doctorate degrees: Ph.D., EdD[3], DProf, EngD, DNursSci, DBA, DD, DSc, DLitt, DA, DMA, DPS, DCL, ThD, PharmD, DrPH, DPT, DPhil, DOM, OMD, PsyD, DSW, LL.D, J.S.D. and S.J.D.
Abbreviations for degrees can place the level either before or after the faculty or discipline, depending on the institution. For example, DSc and ScD both stand for the (higher) doctorate in science. Various other abbreviations also vary between institutions, for instance BS and BSc both stand for 'Bachelor of Science'.
There are various conventions for indicating degrees and diplomas after one's name. In some cultures it is usual to give only the highest acdemic degree. In others, it is usual to give the full sequence, in some cases giving abbreviations also for the discipline, the institution, and (where it applies) the level of honours. In another variation, a 'rule of subsumption' often shortens the list and may obscure the chronology evident from a full listing. Thus 'MSc BA' means that the degrees conferred were - in chronological order - BSc, BA, MSc. The subsumption rule reflects the principle that a person of a given high status does not separately belong to the lower status. For member institutions of the Association of Commonwealth Universities, there is a standard list of abbreviations, but in practise many variations are used. Most notable is the use of the Latin abbreviations 'Oxon.' and 'Cantab.' for the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, in spite of these having been superseded by English 'Oxf.' and 'Camb.' (Other Latin abbreviations include Cantuar. for the University of Kent at Canterbury, and Ebor. for the University of York.) Confusion results from the widespread use of 'SA' for the University of South Australia (instead of S.Aust.) because 'SA' was officially assigned to the University of South Africa; and the use of 'York' instead of 'YorkU' by graduates of York University in Canada.
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The doubling of letters in LL.B., LL.M., LL.D. is because these degrees are in laws, not law. The doubled letter indicates the Latin plural legum as opposed to the singular legis. Abbreviations for the aacdemic degrees in surgery Ch.B. and Ch.M. are from Latin chiruguriae and often indicate a university system patterned after Scottish models. The combination of M.B. with Ch.B. arose from a need to graduate the students at the time of year allocated to graduation rituals, but the legal inability to confer the M.B. before they had been properly approved by professional regulatory bodies. Thus the Ch.B. was conferred first, and the M.B. was conferred later, after registration, and without ceremony. In recent times the two have come to be conferred together and are widely (mis)understood to constitute a single degree.
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