Music Therapy Equivalency

If you have a foundation in music (preferably a bachelor’s degree in music) and wish to become a music therapist, the equivalency program will provide you with the foundational coursework, internship, and graduate studies necessary to earn a Master of Music Therapy degree.  Scholarships are available.

  • Our MMT Equivalency is designed to supplement your foundation in music with the undergraduate and graduate coursework necessary for you to become a board-certified music therapist in just three years.
  • On-campus undergraduate coursework and online graduate coursework allow you to continue your established professional career while you work toward the MMT and board certification.
  • With a focus on community-engaged practice and medical music psychotherapy, you will learn how to provide specialized intensive psychological, emotional, and psychospiritual support to patients in various medical settings such as cancer centers, neonatal intensive care units, and hospices.
  • Explore how to provide ethical, culturally responsive healthcare services that engage patients as active collaborators and stakeholders in their health journeys.
  • Learn to become an adaptive and resilient healthcare professional in a rapidly evolving healthcare ecosystem.

View 2024–2025 Master of Music Therapy Equivalency Curriculum

Audition Overview

Admission to the Mary Pappert School of Music also includes a formal audition. Learn more about the audition process & guidelines.

Program Information

Optional Licensed Professional Counselor Track

Program Type

Major

Degree

Master's

School

Mary Pappert School of Music

Academic Department

Music Education and Music Therapy

Duration

3-year

Required Credit Hours

27 Equivalency credits; 32 Masters credits - total of 59 credit hours

MMT Equivalency Program Director

Meng-Shan Lee

Assistant Professor of Music Therapy

Meng-Shan Lee headshot on a gray background.

Learning Outcomes

Equivalency

  1. Students will demonstrate functional music skills related to voice, piano, guitar, percussion, conducting techniques, and movement.
  2. Students will demonstrate basic knowledge related to the clinical foundations of music therapy practice and music therapy practice as set by the American Music Therapy Professional Competencies.
  3. Students will demonstrate professional, ethical, and cultural reflexivity in clinical and educational settings.
  4. Students will use their music skills, their music therapy knowledge base, reflexivity, supervision, and the scholarly literature to engage in clinical music therapy practice.

Masters

  1. Students and graduates will apply philosophical tenets and clinical techniques of humanistic, psychodynamic, and community-engaged practice in diverse healthcare settings.
  2. Students and graduates will develop the capacity for cultural reflexivity - including but not limited to effectively assessing the ecological systems that comprise their culture and their patients' cultures - that enables ethical and effective partnering with patients in community-based healthcare settings.
  3. Students and graduates will demonstrate expertise in the provision of psychotherapy to diverse patient typologies in community-based and medical healthcare treatment settings.
  4. Graduates will develop the capacity for critical analysis of their practice and the healthcare systems they work within. Students will:
    • Identify knowledge deficits in both their clinical practice and the broader literature base
    • Formulate research questions and/or clinical inquiries that can be used to collect and analyze data
    • Systematically evaluate collected data to construct conclusions directly responsive to the formulated research questions
    • Utilize these conclusions to directly inform and shape their practice
    • Share and disseminate conclusions to colleagues in music therapy and closely related fields through scholarly presentations and writings
  5. Graduates will be positioned to become leaders in the field and in their respective communities and healthcare systems by assuming one or more of the following roles: clinical supervisors, patient advocates, clinician-researchers, and clinician-educators.