Graduate Programs

Online Graduate Programs

Focused on Humane Education

Do you yearn for a world where all people, animals, and nature can thrive? At IHE we believe such a world is possible, and we are working to build it through the transformational field of humane education. Earn your graduate degree online and become a solutionary for a more humane, just, and sustainable world!

What is Humane Education?

Humane education is an action-oriented field of study that draws connections between human rights, animal protection, and environmental sustainability. Humane education prepares people to be compassionate, dedicated solutionaries, able to identify unjust, inhumane, and unsustainable systems and create solutions that enable people, animals, and nature to thrive.

What Do You Study in Humane Education?

Study the interconnected issues that affect people, animals, and the environment and learn how to employ education for effective changemaking in any setting using an intersectional, solutionary approach.

Students in the master’s programs complete an individualized practicum and capstone project, both designed to create a bridge between education and action. Students in the doctoral program apply their learning to their research and dissertation process.

Learn more about each course on our curriculum page.

A Word from the Director of Graduate Programs

Mary Pat Champeau, IHE Director of Graduate Programs, discusses why our graduate programs are unique, what students can expect from the online experience, and what graduates can do with their degrees.

Graduate Program Overview

Students can earn their degree online from anywhere in the world. The programs include an optional one-week residential component offered as a 3-credit course each summer at IHE’s oceanfront campus in Surry, Maine. Students pursuing a doctoral degree meet for periodic residencies. Find more information here.

What to expect from the online graduate program experience:

• Rigorous coursework delivered by faculty who are experts in their content areas
• Strong emphasis on community
• Strategies for educating about environmental, animal, and social justice 
• Focus on what it means to be a solutionary and how to educate others to be solutionaries who are able to address and solve the problems in our communities and world 
• Assignments that encourage students to explore their own attitudes, values, strengths, biases, and aspirations
• A highly-connected online environment where each person’s unique experiences and aspirations are valued 
• Regular zoom meetings with your classmates and faculty
• Individual mentoring related to your projects and goals

Who are These Programs For?

These programs are designed to help people from a wide variety of backgrounds apply a humane education lens to find their vehicle for making long-term, sustainable, personal, and systems change in the world by using their own talents, skills, aspirations, and spheres of influence.

Programs are offered online with three entry points per year (spring, summer, and fall). Learn more about each program below:

There has never been a better time to become a humane educator.
Submit an inquiry to discuss how our online graduate programs can help you do meaningful work that matters to you and to the world.

Career Outlook

Alumni from our graduate programs teach worldwide at all levels of education; work for large and small non-profit organizations as leaders and outreach educators; have founded their own organizations, social businesses, and entrepreneurial projects; and are making change through the arts.

Read about some of our alumni here.

Admissions and Tuition

Admissions Requirements: An undergraduate degree from an accredited university, two letters of recommendation, a statement of purpose, $50 application fee. If you’re in need of an application fee waiver or would like more information on how you can “try out” one of our courses, contact marypat@humaneeducation.org.

Tuition: $732 per credit hour. Please see Tuition and Admission for more information. Financial Aid Available. Credits may be transferable into a master’s program at AUNE from other institutions.