Master of Arts in Educational Leadership & Policy Studies (Workforce Development Leadership)
Program Features
At-a-Glance
In this program, students will learn how to:
- Be visionary leaders and change agents
- Influence political, social, economic, legal and cultural contexts and affect improvement of education policies and practices
- Lead for equity in schools and communities
- Apply ethical and collaborative leadership skills to education issues
Overview
Workforce Development has emerged as a vibrant field in professional education and training. In educational settings, workforce development unites the activities of many units, blending academic, career and technical studies, and advising and counseling.
The Workforce Development Leadership (WDL) program aims to develop leaders from diverse backgrounds with the skills and dispositions to successfully organize and manage workforce development programming. The program focuses on cultivating leaders who promote learning, equity, social justice, opportunity and achievement for all students.
Audience
Our program welcomes professionals from diverse backgrounds passionate about leveraging their industry expertise to contribute to secondary and postsecondary education institutions, social services, community-based organizations, workforce development boards, workforce investment boards, and private-sector businesses.
We aim to equip students with the necessary skills to promote excellence and leadership in workforce advocacy, policy formulation, and decision-making practices within multicultural and diverse contexts.
We also encourage those who aspire to foster effective change management to join us on this journey of empowerment and social justice leadership.
Format
While fully online, courses are approximately 25% synchronous (in real time) and 75% asynchronous (on your own schedule within a given time frame).
Course Offerings
Information Sessions
Coming Soon!
Session Topics
- Learn more about the program
- Interact with program staff and other participants
- Get information about cost, schedules, program length, curriculum, registration and financial aid
If, in the future, you are interested in attending an info session and need to request ADA/ASL compliant and reasonable accommodations that would allow you to participate in this event, please contact the Office of ASL/English Interpreting.
If you need to request accommodations other than ASL/English Interpreting or captioning, please contact the Office for Disability Justice or Human Resources, ADA Analyst. Please contact either office no later than five business days before our event.
Costs
At Sacramento State, we strive to offer the highest quality educational programs at an affordable cost.
The fees for the Fall 2026 incoming cohort are $620 per unit, or $1,860 per course, with a total program cost of $18,600.
Please note that you pay for each course as you enroll in them; you do not need to pay for the full program costs upfront.
Application fees include the $70 non-refundable university application fee paid online through CSU Apply, and a $50 departmental fee which is paid upon formal admission to the program. Admitted students will be given instructions on how to pay the $50 departmental fee.
How to Apply
Upcoming Dates
Application Deadline: June 1, 2026
Basic Requirements
Admission as a classified graduate student requires:
- a baccalaureate degree
- a minimum 2.5 GPA in the last 60 units
- completion and successful review of university and program application materials for admission
- an interview with a program administrator or faculty member
Submission Steps
Step 1: Complete the University Graduate Application online.
- Submit your Cal State Apply application online.
- You can find our program by filtering the results:
- Campus: Sacramento State
- Source: College of Continuing Education
- Start Term: Fall
- Select “Educational Leadership & Policy Studies (Workforce Development Leadership)” as the program
- While completing the application, you must list all colleges/universities you have attended, even if you did not earn a degree from that institution, or enrolled in one class and dropped it.
- You do not need to list each individual course you completed through each institution.
- The $70 non-refundable University Application fee will be paid online at the end of the application before submission.
- If you have technical issues with the application, please call 857-304-2087 for assistance.
- We strongly urge you to submit your application several weeks in advance of the deadline in order to give you enough time to complete the remaining steps in the application process.
Step 2: Submit Supplemental Program Application Documents
In order to be considered for admission, you must also submit all supplemental program application documents. Submit these items in Quadrant IV of the Cal State Apply application.
WDL Supplemental program application documents include:
- A Resume highlighting relevant experience;
- A Personal Statement; (maximum 500 words) that addresses:
- Your experiences or the factors that led you to apply for the program
- The leadership characteristics you believe you possess
- Those personal characteristics you believe you possess that will enable you to be successful in the program, and
- Your professional interests
- Essay (Writing Sample Prompt)
- Describe your ultimate objective(s) in workforce development advocacy. What steps do you plan to take to achieve these objectives?
- Maximum 250 words
- One set of unofficial transcripts from all colleges and universities attended including ALL community colleges attended and colleges where credit was earned. However, there is no need to submit transcripts if your undergraduate degree is from Sacramento State.
- If you have transcripts from institutions outside of the United States, please submit your transcripts one month prior to the deadline to allow time for a foreign credential evaluation. Please review the Office of Graduate Studies website for information about applicants with foreign documents.
- Two letters of recommendation
- Two letters of recommendation are required. It is recommended that one of the references be from a person who has observed the applicant’s graduate-level academic potential (e.g., current or former instructor) and the other reference from a person who has observed the applicant’s relevant experience in diverse settings (e.g., supervisor). NOTE: References from friends or family members will not be accepted.
- Once you have saved an electronic recommendation, an email request will automatically be sent to the recommender on your behalf. Please advise your recommender to look for this email in their inbox, as well as their spam or junk-mail folder, as emails do occasionally get filtered out.
For detailed instructions about applying to Cal State Apply, see the Office of Graduate Studies Application Information and Procedures webpage. You can also visit CSU Apply.
After you have submitted all application materials
About mid-November, once you are deemed a potential candidate for the program, we will contact you to arrange interviews with the program’s faculty coordinators regarding your next step. Interviews may take place through video conferencing or via other online technologies.
We will start sending notifications of admission decisions to applicants shortly after all applicants have been interviewed.
Please keep an eye out for further instructions from the program staff regarding your next steps. If you are formally admitted, you will receive instructions for submitting your $50 departmental fee, and any other final steps in the formal admission process before you can begin the program.
International Applicants
Since this program is fully online, it is not eligible to issue the I-20 form to receive the F-1 student visa. If you are admitted, you will have to complete your coursework from your home country or another location outside of the U.S. If you are already in the U.S. but under a different visa status, you need to contact the Office of International Programs & Global Engagement (IPGE) first to determine if you are allowed to apply to this program. You may also choose to contact IPGE to see if they have any other program recommendations for international students.