Exams and Assessments

• To demonstrate an understanding of core BME knowledge, potential Ph.D. students in the Department of Biomedical Engineering must achieve a minimum performance in the topics covered by the graduate BME core curriculum. Specifically, each student must achieve a minimum grade of B in each individual core course.

  • Students who do not reach this level of performance after their first time through one or more of the courses will be given one additional opportunity to prove their competency by retaking (officially or unofficially) the course or courses for which they did not receive a grade of B or higher.  At the discretion of the relevant core course instructor(s), the student can unofficially audit the course, complete all assignments and exams, and receive an (unofficial) grade that will be used to determine competency.  This is only an option if the student has maintained the minimum GPA requirements to avoid academic probation from the School of Graduate Studies. Alternatively, students can officially retake the course and their grade for this course will be used to determine competency. Students who are not able to meet the core competency performance levels after two attempts will not be permitted to continue in the Ph.D. program. Note, neither the department nor the PI are obligated to pay for the same course twice due to the students’ poor performance.  Tuition expenses for retaking a class may be at the students’ expense.

  • Competency for students who seek to be excused by the GEC from taking one or more of the core courses will be determined in a manner described below, except using the final grades from others courses that act as proxies for the core courses that have been waived.  Specifically:

• The GEC may waive the requirement to take one or more of the core courses for Ph.D.-bound students with significant previous background in one or more of the topics of the core courses.  

• In order to assess the competency of students that wish to receive a waiver of core courses, a competency exam may be administered before the start of classes:

  • One exam may be administered for each of the three core courses. The exams will be optional for first year graduate students only.  The exam will be administered by the faculty.  No review on the content of the exam will be provided, but the course syllabus from previous years will be supplied as requested.  The exam will be scored Pass/Fail by the faculty administering the exam, and only the results of the exam will be shared, as the exam will be similar in content to final exams for the courses.  No retakes or petitions over scoring will be heard. 

  • If a student passes one or more core competency exams, the student will receive a waiver from the GEC for the courses that were passed.  The waiver frees the students from the core course requirement, but not from the equivalent required credit hours – meaning that the student must replace the course with additional course(s) in areas of breadth, engineering, biological science, or mathematics (for example). Any such substitute courses must be approved by the GEC prior to taking the course.

    • If a student receives a grade lower than B for any of these proxy courses, the student will either have to (1) retake the course as described above and receive a grade of B or higher or (2) take the core course that was initially waived and receive a grade of B or higher.

Ph.D. students must demonstrate the ability to integrate fundamental BME knowledge, and to apply measurement principles and analysis techniques to solve biomedical engineering problems.  This integrative ability will be assessed during an oral exam administered by a committee of BME primary faculty.  

• All first-year students must take the qualifying exam in their first year.  Students entering the program off-cycle (i.e., January start), may take the qualifying exam in their first year. The oral exams are scheduled during the period between the end of classes in the Spring semester and the start of classes in the Fall semester.  

• In order to take the Oral Qualifying Exam, students must register for EBME 700 for the Summer Term in which they take the exam.

Pass

• Once a student passes the oral qualifying exam, they are eligible to advance to candidacy.

Fail (Re-Take)

• If a student does not pass the oral exam on their first attempt, they must submit a remediation plan to the GEC for review and approval that describes the actions they will take to improve their performance.

  • The remediation plan must be submitted to the GEC within two months of failing the exam. 

  • Students are encouraged to discuss preparation for the exam with their academic advisor and senior students in the department.  Practice for the exam is also encouraged utilizing these resources.

  • All questions about outcomes of the exam should be brought to the Chair of the Ph.D. Oral Qualifier Exam Committee.

• Starting in Fall 2023, an additional Winter exam has been offered for students needing to re-take the exam, and is expected to continue being available.

• If a student does not pass after two opportunities, they will not be permitted to continue in the Ph.D. program.

1. Complete the Advance to Candidacy Form after: 

   1. • Earning a Pass in EBME 570. 

      • Achieving a grade of A or B in EBME 454. 

2. Once you have received your research advisor's signature, send to the GEC Chair (ajs215@case.edu). He will check the form and send to graduate studies with email approval.

3. Please enter date of the last day of class, for the semester in which you complete all the above requirements, in the qualifying exam line.

Research competency—Research Proposal and Defense:  

• Students are expected to write and defend their R21-style proposal to their PhD committees within one-year of completing their oral qualifying exam; otherwise Strikes will begin to accrue (Important Policies: Strike Policy).

• In order to take the Research Competency Exam, students must register for EBME 702 for the Term in which they take the exam.

Description

The final step in the Ph.D. qualification process is the composition and oral defense of a research proposal in the form of an NIH R21 application. 

As described by the NIH website, http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/pa-files/PA-10-069.html, the R21 mechanism “is intended to encourage exploratory/developmental research by providing support for the early and conceptual stages of project development”. A short, concise proposal written according to this funding mechanism is thus appropriate for a student in the formative stages of his or her research project to acquire the skills for conceiving and writing a research proposal.  The research proposal can be hypothesis-driven or design-driven. It should include specific aims, innovation, significance, research strategy and references.  The intent for the written proposal and associated oral presentation and defense is to evaluate the ability of the student to formulate a research problem, to state hypotheses or outline design objectives, to propose a research plan using feasible design, experiment and analysis techniques to either test those hypotheses or achieve the design objectives, and to interpret data. While this proposal will often represent the research ultimately pursued by the student, it is recognized that the details of the proposal and even its goals may evolve significantly over time. Students who have written fellowship proposals are encouraged to use the same concepts in this research proposal, but they should convert the material into the NIH R21 format and should include all of the required components.

It is expected that the preparation of the written proposal will be a mentored activity with the research advisor, while the oral presentation and defense will specifically test the understanding and research capabilities of the student. A student will have passed the examination when he/she demonstrates the ability to successfully write and defend a research proposal. The oral presentation (should be ~20 min long) and defense will be administered by the student’s guidance committee. An important role of the committee chair is to ensure that the proposal exam requirements are met, that the proposed research contains both engineering and life sciences content, and to ensure some uniformity of exam difficulty across all students.  If a student is judged to have not passed this exam, the committee will provide critique and the student is expected to defend a revised proposal within 4 months.  If the student cannot pass the oral exam associated with this first revised proposal, they will not be permitted to continue in the Ph.D. program.

Students will be eligible to defend their research proposal after they have successfully completed the “core competency” (part 1) and “oral exam” (part 2) components of the Ph.D. qualification process.  

*NOTE, The entire committee MUST PARTICIPATE (in the room or call in) for an R21 defense to be valid.