The NASSP Master's programme is in the form of a course work component plus a research dissertation component and should take a total of 18 months to complete (i.e. from January in Year 1 to June in Year 2). The first 6 months are spent on the coursework and students are based at UCT. During the following 12 months students will be located at the institution of their MSc supervisor.
Coursework:
Students are required to take modules with a total of 5 credits. The modules offered for 2026 are shown in the table below.
| Module | Credits | Convenor |
| Stellar Astrophysics | 1 | Prof Chris Engelbrecht (Emeritus) |
| Radio interferometry | 1 | Dr Kenda Knowles (SARAO/RU) |
| Accreting Compact Binaries | 1 | Dr Steve Potter (SAAO) |
| Extragalactic Astronomy | 1 | Prof DJ Pisano (UCT) |
| Data Science for Astronomy | 1 | Mr Walter Silima (IDIA) |
| Instrumentation | 1 | Dr Nicholas Erasmus (SAAO) |