Program

Qualifying Exam

Every student must take and pass a comprehensive, written qualifying examination at the end of the first year.

Qualifying exams will be offered at a specified time during the summer and prior to the start of fall classes. The outcome of the exam will be “pass,” “conditional pass” or “fail.”

A conditional pass indicates that a student has significant deficiencies in one of the areas tested. This student would be required to take and pass (B or better) designated course(s) in the following year to “pass” the qualifying exam. Students who fail on the first attempt may retake the exam at the next scheduled date. Students who fail twice are released from the Ph.D. program.

By passing the qualifying exam, the students demonstrate that they understand materials and their properties from the atomic to the macroscopic levels and have familiarity with the growing set of materials fabrication, assembly, processing, characterization, and modeling tools and techniques.