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Advancing to candidacy consists of two major steps: forming an approved PhD committee and going through a candidacy evaluation with the committee members.
Forming a Committee and Requesting Announcement of the Committee to the ECE GSC
Your candidacy and PhD dissertation will be overseen by the same committee of faculty members. This committee will consist of five members, including your supervisor(s). At least three members must be on the ECE GSC, and ECE must be the home department of at least two of those three ECE GSC members. At least one member of your committee must be from outside of the ECE GSC. The process of forming this committee and approval of the committee is comprised of several steps listed below, and can often take more than a month to complete.
| Step 1: | With the assistance of your faculty supervisor, identify and contact potential committee members to ask for their general willingness to serve on your committee. Students should provide a 1-2 page abstract of the proposed research and a Program of Work (list of coursework) when contacting potential members. |
| Step 2: | When you have received tentative agreement from your proposed committee members, contact your Track PhD Coordinator with the names of your committee and request that your committee be announced to the ECE GSC, Graduate Studies Committee. This is a required step! |
| Step 3: | Your committee will be voted on and approved by the ECE GSC on a no-protest basis. You must wait two weeks after the announcement is made by your track's faculty PhD Coordinator before you conduct one-on-one Candidacy Evaluation meetings with each committee member except your supervisor(s) (or before you conduct a Qualifying Examination in front of the whole committee, including your supervisor(s) if you were admitted prior to fall 2018 and you choose to hold a Qualifying Examination instead.) Please wait for confirmation of committee approval from the Graduate Advising Team before moving onto the Evaluation Process.Candidacy Evaluation process or the Qualifying Examination (only for students admitted prior to fall 2018 if they choose the Qualifying Examination process.) |
Candidacy Evaluation
Once your committee is formed and approved, you will need to reach out to and setup a time to meet individually with each member of your committee for approximately 30 minutes. Each candidacy evaluation should have the following suggested format:
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