Degree requirements in the Ph.D. program in Computer Science.

Last major revision: August 23, 2004.

Last update: August 30, 2004.

Previous major revision: September 17, 2001.

Click here for an explanation of the recent updates and revisions of this document and for Frequently Asked Questions.

This document describes the requirements for a doctorate from the Computer Science Department at the University of Chicago for students entering in the fall of 2004 or later. Those students who entered the program prior to this date should consult the appropriate previous versions of this document.

If you are looking for the Masters Program, you are reading the wrong page.

If, after having studied this document, you have questions regarding the Ph. D. requirements, please send email to gradadmissions@cs.uchicago.edu.

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Introduction

Research is the single most important aspect of a graduate career in the Ph.D. program.

The Ph.D. program proceeds in two phases of quite different character.

During the first phase, students fulfill a "distribution requirement" by completing a certain set of courses under a tight schedule; study additional "research focus" courses, and write a Master's Thesis. This phase is expected to take up to two years and one quarter.

The sequence of courses for the distribution requirement consists of five core courses, three electives, and a course named "Big Ideas in Computer Science." Students must complete the distribution requirement by the end of the third quarter of their second year in the program. Students must complete and defend their Master's Paper by the fifth week of the first quarter of their third year.

Students engage in research-oriented studies from the very beginning of the program. In each quarter they take at least one "research focus" course, selected with the help of their advisor.

The set of core courses has been designed to bring sharp focus to the foundations of the program and to foster collegiality between our graduate students.

Students may complete the core courses either on a "Master's Pass" or on a "Ph.D. Pass" level. Those who achieve the "Ph.D. Pass" and satisfy all other requirements may proceed to the second phase of the program.

During the second phase, students engage in independent research. Successful research will be documented in research publications and a Ph.D. dissertation. The selection of an advisor and the relationship between the advisor and the advisee are critical during the entire process.

There are two tracks in our Ph.D. program:

  • the standard Computer Science track;
  • the Computational Mathematics track.

Each track leads to the degree "Ph.D. in Computer Science." The structure of the two tracks is identical; the only difference between the two tracks is in the list of required courses. This document focuses on the standard track; click here for the list of required courses and other specifics of the Computational Mathematics track.

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Master's Degree within the Ph. D. program

Students working toward the Ph.D. must first obtain their Master's Degree within the Ph.D. program. The process leading to this degree is part of the Ph.D. program and must not be confused with the Masters Program offered by this department.

Ph.D. students are required to complete their Master's Degree by the end of the autumn quarter in third year of their graduate studies.

In order to obtain the Master's Degree, students in the Ph.D. program must meet the following requirements:

  • Complete the Distribution Requirement by the end of the third quarter of the second year of studies; this includes completing the core courses on a "Ph.D. Pass" or "Master's Pass" level.
  • Identify a research area and an advisor for a Master's Paper by the beginning of the first quarter of the second year.
  • Complete a Master's Paper.
  • Pass the Master's Exam by the fifth week of the autumn quarter of the third year of studies.

Students must also meet the University Requirements and obtain Final Approval.

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From Master's to Ph. D.

By the end of their first year of studies, students select an area of independent research. Their contribution to scholarship will be published in the Ph.D. thesis.

Along the way to obtaining the doctorate, the following requirements must be met:

Students must also meet the University Requirements and obtain Final Approval.

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Advisors and Committees

Every graduate student must have an advisor who is responsible for monitoring his or her academic progress. The Department assigns each student entering the program a temporary advisor who serves only until the student has become affiliated with a thesis advisor.

By the end of the first year, the student must have a thesis advisor. The thesis advisor directs the student in the preparation of the Master's Paper, guides the student's doctoral research, and chairs the Examination Committee at the Master's exam, the Candidacy exam, and the Doctoral Thesis defense.

The student/advisor relationship is a central aspect of the graduate program. To maintain the effectiveness of this relationship, it requires the ongoing consent of both parties -- either party can withdraw from the relationship by notifying the Graduate Committee chair. If a student has difficulty finding a thesis advisor, they should seek the help of the Graduate Committee chair or the Department chair. The Department chair must approve a nondepartmental advisor.

Before the Master's exam, each graduate student should also have an Examination Committee consisting of at least three members, including the student's thesis advisor. The committee must be acceptable to both the student and the advisor, and at least half of the members of the committee must be members of the departmental faculty. As with the student/advisor relationship, membership in the Examination Committee requires the ongoing consent of the student and the committee member.

While advisors will monitor their students' progress, it is ultimately the students' responsibility that they meet each of the requirements in this document.

The Graduate Committee shall be notified of all changes in advisor or Examination Committee status.

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Faculty Reviews

The faculty will meet after the end of the winter quarter. At this meeting the faculty will decide for each student whether that student is making sufficient progress to continue in the Ph.D. program. Students will be notified each year during the spring quarter whether or not they will be permitted to continue in the Ph.D. program the next autumn. Such notification may be conditioned on the satisfactory completion of certain courses by the end of spring during the second year of studies (see the Distribution Requirements below) or conditioned on other measures of progress to be determined by the faculty for each student.

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Distribution Requirement: "Ph. D. Pass"

All students must complete an approved sequence of nine courses. An approved sequence consists of the five core courses, three electives, and the "Big Ideas in Computer Science" course.

The motto is: demonstrate proficiency in all areas and excellence in at least one area.

The minimum formal requirements for the core courses ("Ph.D. Pass") are the following.

Students are required to complete the five core courses by the end of the spring quarter of their second year of studies with a grade of at least B in each core course and with a grade point average (GPA) of at least 3.25 in the five core courses. In computing the GPA, A=4, B=3, and a + or a - counts as 1/3 of a point. So for instance a student with the grades A-, B+, B+, B, B in the five core courses has a GPA of 3 4/15 = 3.27 and thus passes the minimum GPA requirement.

The electives must be completed by the end of spring during the second year of studies with a grade of at least B in each course.

Students must pass the "Big Ideas in Computer Science" course during autumn of their first year.

Students who do not meet these minimum requirements cannot continue their studies beyond autumn of the third year. Students who do meet these minimum requirements will not automatically be allowed to continue after their second year; the faculty will decide continuation based on the student's perceived capacity of Ph. D. level independent research in a specific area.

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Distribution Requirement: "Master's Pass"

Students who fail to meet the core course requirements stated in the preceding section may continue into the autumn quarter of their third year of studies if they meet the following requirement ("Master's Pass"): complete all the five core courses by the end of the spring quarter of the second year with a grade of at least B- in each core course and with a grade point average (GPA) of at least 3.00 in the five core courses.

Students who do not meet this requirement cannot continue beyond the third quarter of their second year. Those who satisfy the stated minimum requirement may continue until and including the first quarter of their third year. They must complete the three electives by the end of spring during their second year of studies with a grade of at least B- in each course in order to be eligible for a Master's Degree.

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Big Ideas

During the first quarter of their studies, each student is required to take the course

  • CMSC 31100 - Big Ideas in Computer Science. (Offered each autumn, replaces CMSC 31000, graded on a Pass/Fail basis.)
*** The areas covered include computability,... ***

This course is a prerequisite to all the core courses except Discrete Mathematics.

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The Core

The core courses are intended to provide firm foundations and guarantee sufficient breadth. Each student selects a set of five core courses out of the list below; the selection must include two Theory courses, two Systems courses, and one course in Artificial Intelligence. Currently, only the Systems list permits students a choice.

    Core Courses: Theory

  • CMSC 37110 - Discrete Mathematics. (Offered each autumn. Required in the first quarter of studies. In addition to providing the mathematical foundations to much of computer science, including discrete probability, linear algebra, and asymptotic analysis, this course gives students the opportunity to practice the rudiments of mathematical thinking through rigorous problem solving. This course is a prerequisite to Algorithms and to Introduction to AI.)
  • CMSC 37000 - Algorithms. (Offered each winter.)

    Core Courses: Systems

  • CMSC 33000 - Operating Systems. (Offered each winter.)
  • CMSC 32200 - Computer Architecture. (Offered each spring.)
  • CMSC 33300 - Networks and Distributed Systems. (Offered each spring. This course is the third part of the basic Systems sequence 33000--32200--33300.)
  • CMSC 32630 - Advanced Implementation of Computer Languages. (Offered each autumn.)

    Core Courses: Artificial Intelligence

  • CMSC 35000 - Introduction to Artificial Intelligence. (Offered each winter.)

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Electives

The following courses are currently approved by the Department as electives to fulfill the Distribution Requirement. To ensure the overall direction, each student's advisor must approve the student's selection of electives. To ensure sufficient breadth, no more than two of the electives chosen by each student may be in any of the general areas of Theory or AI.

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Substitutions

The Department does not guarantee that all the electives listed will be offered in any given period of time. Students may petition the Graduate Committee to substitute other courses for those listed in case of unavailability.

A student with a suitable background may petition the Graduate Committee to replace the above courses with more advanced course work.

Students are urged to submit their petitions for substitution before they take a course with which they intend to fulfill the Distribution Requirement.

"Reading and Research" courses may not be used to fulfill the Core requirement.

"Reading and Research" courses may not be used to replace electives except under the most extenuating circumstances. Such exception must be approved by the Graduate Committee. Students are encouraged to check with the Graduate Committee chair in advance, but final approval of a "Reading and Research" course to fulfill a course requirement will in general be only given after the completion of the course work.

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"Research Focus" courses

Each quarter during the first two academic years of their studies, students are required to enroll in a course that facilitates their future research careers. These courses will be chosen with the direct input of the student's advisor. Examples of such courses include "Reading and Research" (RR) courses, topics courses, graduate seminars, or courses in other departments that build useful tools for future research.

At the end of each quarter, students write a report (one to two pages) about their fulfillment of this requirement, describing in some detail the work they have done. Substantial effort must be demonstrated; merely attending a seminar or reading a collection of papers, for example, would not be considered sufficient.

Comments by the instructor of the course must be added to the report, assessing the student's effort demonstrated in the course. If the course is a course in another department and the student obtained a letter grade in the course, the grade is sufficient in lieu of the instructor's comments.

Finally the student's advisor must add his/her approval. The complete report must be submitted to the Graduate Committee within two weeks of the completion of the quarter. This document will become part of the student's record used by the faculty to evaluate the student's progress.

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The Computational Mathematics Track

In addition to the standard Computer Science track described in detail in this document, we also offer a Computational Mathematics (CM) track toward the Ph.D. in Computer Science. All the rules set out in this document apply to the CM track as well as to the standard track except that students taking the CM track are required to take a different set of core courses and will choose from a different set of electives. Click here for these and other specifics of the CM track.

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Master's Paper and Exam

Each student must complete a Master's paper and put a copy on public display at least two weeks before the presentation of the paper. The paper must demonstrate knowledge of a particular area of computer science, including in-depth familiarity with the related literature.

The student must give a public presentation of the paper, followed by a private exam. At the public presentation and in the private exam, the student must be able to give detailed answers to questions about the work described in the paper. The exam will be administered by the Examination Committee.

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Candidacy Exam

Each student must pass a candidacy exam administered by the Examination Committee by the end of the student's third year. Before the exam, the student must have an exam proposal approved by each member of the Examination Committee. The student should post the approved proposal to the standard location (currently the uchi.cs newsgroup) and notify the Graduate Committee chair at least two weeks before the exam. The committee will decide the format of the exam. Usually, the committee will administer a private oral exam that tests depth and breadth in areas related to the student's doctoral research.

If a graduate student changes advisor after completion of the candidacy exam, the new advisor may require the student to retake the exam.

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Foreign Language Competency

The department requires each student to be able to read a technical paper in a foreign language with use of a foreign language dictionary.

This requirement is overseen by the Graduate Committee. Please contact the Graduate Committee chair well in advance to plan for this exam.

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Doctoral Thesis and Defense

The department requires each student to write a Doctoral thesis that includes significant original research in computer science.

The student must successfully defend his or her thesis in a public forum before the Examination Committee and any other interested faculty members. The Examination Committee will decide the format for the defense. The thesis defense must occur at least two weeks after the student has given proper notice. Proper notice consists of the following actions:

  1. The student must give a draft of the thesis, approved by the advisor, to each member of the Examination Committee and to the Graduate Committee chair. The draft must be nearly complete with only minor changes expected in the final version.
  2. The student must give the draft of the thesis draft to the department's administrative assistant. The administrative assistant will register the thesis and put the copy on public display.
  3. The student must put an additional copy on display in the standard common area (currently the CS lounge).
  4. The thesis abstract must be posted to the standard location (currently the uchi.cs newsgroup).

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University Requirements

In addition to the departmental requirements, every graduate student must fulfill the University requirements for the appropriate degree (Master's Degree or Ph. D.), including residency requirements, proper degree registration, payment of fines, etc. The University prints these rules each quarter in the Time Schedule, and makes them available in the Student Manual of University Policies and Regulations. The University also publishes requirements for the formatting and acceptance of the Ph.D. dissertation. For additional information contact the Office of Academic Publications (acapubs@uchicago.edu, (312) 702-7404).

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Transfer Students

Students transferring from a different graduate program may petition the Graduate Committee for having some of the above requirements fulfilled by work done at the previous institution.

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Record Keeping and Final Approval

Each time that a student changes advisors or his or her Examination Committee, that student should fill out the "Advisor and Examination Committee change form." For the Master's paper and exam and for the fulfillment of the course requirements, as well as for the candidacy exam, the foreign language exam, and the doctoral thesis defense, the student should have the appropriate form filled out and give the form to the Graduate Committee chair. The Graduate Committee chair will record the information on these forms and place the forms in the student's permanent record.

While the department will make every effort to ensure the accuracy of student records, it is highly recommended that students keep a copy of each form they turn in to the Graduate Committee chair.

After the student meets all the requirements for a degree (Master's Degree or Ph. D.), the student should get the appropriate "Final approval form" signed by the chair of the Graduate Committee and the chair of the department. In order to receive a degree in a certain quarter, the student must submit an Application for Degree when they register for that quarter. The student must then submit the required material to the university by the appropriate date, normally the Friday three weeks before the convocation at which the student expects the degree. For the Ph. D., the university's thesis requirements must be met.

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Exceptions to the Requirements

Exceptions to these requirements will be made only in the most extenuating of circumstances. Students considering to petition for an exception should first consult their advisor and the Graduate Committee Chair. Minor exceptions require approval of the Graduate Committee. Major exceptions require approval of the entire faculty. No exceptions can be made to the University requirements.

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