Dissertation Committee
The committee must have a minimum of five members including the Dean’s Representative.
The committee must have at least three Full Members of the Graduate Faculty (excluding the Dean’s Representative), [effective beginning summer 2025] including two full members of the CEE faculty.
The committee Chair should be the student’s advisor and must be a Full Member of the Graduate Faculty.
The Dean’s Representative must be a Full Member of the Graduate Faculty from another UMD department.
Other member(s) of the committee must be members of the Graduate Faculty (Full, Associate, Special).
The committee members should have backgrounds and interests related broadly to the subject matter of the dissertation.
Footnotes/Caveats
If the Dean's Representative is a non-voting member of the committee, then the committee must have an additional Full Member of the Graduate Faculty who can be either from CEE or another UMD department.
If the dissertation committee is chaired jointly by two faculty members, together they only count as one CEE Full Member, i.e., another CEE Full member must be on the committee.
Special and Associate Members must have a PhD degree.
Dissertation Defense Procedure
Students should follow all the steps and deadlines outlined in Graduation Information.
Steps include: applying for graduation, nominating dissertation committee for Graduate School approval, providing the committee with a copy of the dissertation, announcing dissertation defense, etc.
Defense Outcomes
The committee accepts the dissertation without any recommended changes and sign the Report of the Examining Committee.
The committee recommends changes and, except for the Chair, the committee members sign the Report of the Examining Committee. The Chair will check the dissertation and, upon his or her approval, sign the Report of the Examining Committee.
The committee recommends revisions to the dissertation and does not sign the Report of Examining Committee until the student has made the changes and submitted the revised dissertation for the committee’s approval. The committee members sign the Report of Examining Committee if they approve the revised dissertation.
The committee recommends revisions and convenes a second meeting to review the dissertation and complete the defense.
The committee rules the dissertation (including the defense) unsatisfactory. In that circumstance, the student will have failed the examination and will not be awarded the doctorate.
Miscellaneous
It is expected that each Ph.D. candidate will have a publication published or submitted by the time of the defense and that the Ph.D. dissertation will result in at least 2 journal peer-review publications.