Advancement to Candidacy

When a student passes the Qualifying Exam requirement, the student must then apply to be admitted to candidacy.  An advisor-approved Application for Admission to Candidacy form for advancement to candidacy must be submitted to the Graduate School. The student must have a GPA of 3.5 or higher to advance to candidacy. Any doctoral student admitted to candidacy will automatically be registered for 6 credits of ENCE899 Doctoral Dissertation Research credits every fall and spring semester thereafter until the degree is awarded. 

A student must be admitted to candidacy for the doctorate within five years after admission to the doctoral program. It is the responsibility of the student to submit an application for admission to candidacy when all the requirements for candidacy have been fulfilled. After advancing to candidacy, the student must complete 12 credits hours of ENCE 899, and be a Ph.D. candidate for at least six months before graduation. 

Advisor-approved applications for admission to candidacy should be submitted to Anna Damm for further action and transmission to the Graduate School. Paperwork must be received by the Graduate School prior to the 25th of the month in order for the advancement to become effective the first day of the following month. For example, paperwork submitted on January 21 would result in the student advancing to candidacy as of February 1. Likewise, paperwork submitted on January 26 would result in the student advancing to candidacy as of March 1.

Doctoral candidates are automatically registered for six (6) credits of Doctoral Dissertation Research (899), for which they pay the flat candidacy tuition.