ON THIS PAGE:

Advising

Administration

Courses

Program Product Requirement

Technical Writing Requirement

Comprehensive Examination

Other Requirements

Summary and Required Forms

This document lists the combined requirements of the Graduate School and of the Department of Computer Science (COMP) and supersedes all previous issues. Reference is occasionally made for further details to the Graduate School Handbook (GSH). Page references are to the 2005 edition. Apparent errors in the present document should be called to the attention of the Director of Graduate Studies.

Advising
Advisers provide advice, of course, but they are also contact points for advising bulletins, registration PINs, and alerting the student to academic progress milestones. During the faculty's review of student progress, the adviser is called upon to describe the student's progress and discuss any problems or delays in that progress.

When a student enrolls in the department, a faculty member is appointed to serve as the student's initial program adviser. While the department administration tries to match student and adviser interests in the assignment of initial program advisers, these assignments are based on incomplete information and are not binding. Students should change the faculty adviser as appropriate as the student's plans and interests change.

To request a change of adviser, the student should send the request by e-mail to the Student Services Manager with copies to the Director of Graduate Studies and the involved faculty (old and new advisers). Such requests are usually approved without comment, but factors such as faculty load sometimes intervene. Consultation with the Director of Graduate Studies is recommended in advance of a change of adviser for any reason other than designation of the research director as the program adviser. (Changes of adviser for that reason are completely normal and almost automatically approved.) If a student elects to write a thesis for the M.S. degree, the thesis adviser should be designated the official program adviser and chair of the student's guidance committee.

The Director of Graduate Studies serves as the backup adviser for routine signatures in case the program adviser is not available.

Administration
The Graduate Studies Committee (a standing committee of the department faculty, chaired by the Director of Graduate Studies) interprets degree requirements, approves plans of study, and acts on petitions from students to the department and to the Graduate School.

A full-time Graduate Student Services Manager maintains student records, answers student queries, and directs student requests to the Graduate Studies Committee and to the Graduate School. All student requests should be made through the Student Services Manager, usually on forms obtainable online or from the Manager, whose office is 135 Sitterson Hall. The Manager will handle the forms or forward them to the appropriate office.

Courses
Thirty (30) semester hours of courses numbered 400 or higher (100 or higher on the old course numbering system) must be taken, of which at least 18 hours must be in Computer Science (designated COMP in the catalog) of which up to 6 hours may be COMP 993 (393): Master's Thesis Research. The choice of courses is subject to approval by the Graduate Studies Committee in the mandatory review of the M.S. Program of Study (Form CS-3). Registrations for COMP 990 (390) for research team meetings (denoted by section numbers > 100) do not count toward the credit hours requirement; other COMP 990 registrations do count.

Breadth requirement.  Each student must take one course in each of the following categories to fulfill a breadth requirement.

• Theory & Formal Thinking
• Systems & Hardware
• Applications

The set of breadth courses must meet the following criteria.

1. At most one course in the set can be at the 500 level. The other courses must be at the 600 level or above (the old 200 or above).
2. All courses must have been taken as a graduate student. Courses taken at UNC that satisfy the guidelines for the set of breadth courses will be accepted automatically. The Graduate Studies Committee will consider courses taken at another graduate program, or equivalent professional experience, and/or graduate courses taken during undergraduate study, on a case by case basis.

The student's mastery of content will be determined by the course grade in the set of three courses: a P- or better must be obtained in each course, and a Calingaert score of -3 or higher must be obtained on the three courses combined.

The Calingaert Score is a weighted average of course grades, where the weights are chosen so that a score of 0 reflects an average letter grade between a P+ and an H-. The weights for the letter grades are as follows:

Grade	H+	H	H-	P+	P	P-	L+	L	L-
Weight	+5	+3	+1	-1	-3	- 5	-7	-9	-11

For example, the Calingaert Score for three courses with letter grades P+, H-, and H would be (-1 + 1 + 3)/3 = +1.0 (assuming the three courses carry the same number of credit hours). The name recognizes Dr. Peter Calingaert, professor emeritus, who devised the measure when he was Director of Graduate Studies.

Background Preparation.  In addition, each student must demonstrate mastery of the subjects considered to be essential or required preparation for our graduate program. The following UNC courses define the required preparation for our program (for a more detailed description of course contents, consult the UNC course catalog).

Computer Science

• COMP 411 (120) Computer Organization
• COMP 410 (121) Data Structures
• COMP 550 (122) Algorithms and Analysis
• Any two of the following
  1. COMP 521 (130) Files and Databases
  2. COMP 520 (140) Compilers
  3. COMP 530 (142) Operating Systems
• COMP 524 (144) Programming Language Concepts
• COMP 523 (145) Software Engineering (this requirement may also be satisfied by completing the product quality, large scale programming option below)
• COMP 541 (160) Digital Logic and Computer Design
• COMP 455 (181) Models of Languages and Computation

Mathematics, Statistics, and Physics

• MATH 233 (33) Calculus of Functions of Several Variables
• MATH 381 (81) Discrete Mathematics
• MATH 547 (147) Linear Algebra for Applications
• MATH 661 (191) Introduction to Numerical Analysis (Scientific Computing I)
• STAT 435 (126) Introduction to Probability

Typically most of this material will have been part of the student's undergraduate education, but it is entirely normal to include one or more courses in the M.S. Program of Study to satisfy this requirement. Each student must detail their Background Preparation (Form CS-1) showing when and where the material above was mastered. In case of uncertainty about the material required in a particular course, consult an instructor of the course or the instructor(s) of courses that include the material as a prerequisite. The program adviser and the Graduate Studies Committee review background preparation.

Up to six semester hours of graduate credit may be transferred from another accredited institution, or from courses taken at UNC-CH before admission to the Graduate School, or for courses taken in a different graduate program at UNC-CH, in partial fulfillment of the 30-hour total credits requirement (GSH 3).

Course transfers should be indicated on the Program of Study form and must be approved by the Graduate Studies Committee and by the Graduate School. The Graduate School may require the student to pass an examination on the course content before approving the transfer. The transfer of courses to meet the distribution requirement will generally require an examination.

Courses taken at Duke University, N.C. Central University, N.C. State University, UNC-Charlotte, and UNC-Greensboro count as home courses requiring no formal transfer (GSH 3, GSH 6).

Before completing the first 18 hours of courses, the student shall submit to the Graduate Studies Committee their background preparation (on form CS-1, approved by the program adviser), and a proposed plan of study (on form CS-3) chosen after consultation with the program adviser. The student may submit a plan early to find out what will be acceptable, and may specify choices such as "Course x or Course y", retaining the right to make the choice later if it is approved.

Each student is strongly encouraged to elect at least three hours taught by a department other than COMP, unless the student has an unusually broad background.

COMP 910 (220) is a device called a "module course" that permit a student to take part of a course for part of the credit. Thus a student who is familiar with the content of part of a course, but not the whole course, is not forced to choose between omitting the course and taking all of it. This helps a student with better than minimum preparation to make room for more advanced courses in the student's area of interest.

The decision to create a module of a course belongs to the instructor of the full course. The student should begin by contacting the instructor to negotiate what the module(s) should cover. The instructor should communicate the decision to the Associate Chairman for Academic Affairs. Creation of a module and registration are performed on a case-by-case basis by the Associate Chairman for Academic Affairs and the Registration Coordinator.

The election of a minor field is optional and infrequent. If a minor is elected, it must include at least 9 hours of courses that are taught by departments other than COMP (and not merely cross-listings of COMP courses). The minor must also meet all the requirements described in GSH 15.

In the event that one COMP graduate student takes a course taught by another COMP graduate student, the Director of Graduate Studies should be consulted to determine whether credit can be granted (GSH 14).

Program Product Requirement

Each student is required to have programmed and documented a product-quality program product. This means that the student must demonstrate experience in the design, development, and documentation of a software product of significant size and complexity, preferably as part of a team. This requirement can be satisfied in one of the following ways.

• An undergraduate software engineering course, such as COMP 523 (the old 145),
• graduate course programming assignments or projects at UNC,
• RA programming assignments at UNC, or
• industrial experience (e.g. co-op or summer internship).

The project options must be approved by two faculty members.  The student must file Form CS-13 to document completion of the requirement.

Technical Writing Requirement
Each student must demonstrate the ability to write a professional-quality technical document. There are three options available for satisfying this requirement, as follows:

Comprehensive Paper Option
The paper should be either a project report that includes a comprehensive survey of the literature, or a survey and synthesis of a substantial body of work. The document satisfying the technical writing requirement should be a product of working closely with a faculty advisor, the primary reader, through multiple iterations of writing refinement and feedback.  The paper is then presented to the secondary reader for review. A requirement is that both readers judge the paper to be of M.S. thesis or publication quality with respect to both substance and presentation. This option must be reported on Form CS-8.

Thesis Option
A written thesis is based either on research or on the solution and documentation of a substantial problem in application or system programming. The subject is chosen jointly by the student and the thesis adviser. The student selects a guidance committee of at least three members of the Graduate Faculty. The student must submit a brief written thesis proposal to the committee members during the early stages of thesis work.

The thesis must meet normal standards of scholarly writing and prescribed standards of form (GSH 17 and the Graduate School document Guide to Theses and Dissertations).

The student must register for at least three hours, but not more than six hours, of COMP 993 (393): Masters Thesis. Registration for COMP 993 can reduce to 24 the number of hours of non-research courses that the student must take (GSH 16).

A student who elects to write a thesis must make an oral presentation of the thesis to the guidance committee. Before this presentation can take place, the adviser and at least one other member of the student's committee must agree that the thesis is in substantially finished form. The student may elect that the presentation be public. In that event the student gives a 50-minute presentation of the thesis, followed by questions from the committee and then from the audience. If the committee wishes, it may continue to question the student in private. If the student elects a private presentation, it will be of such form and duration as are prescribed by the committee. Public presentations are encouraged as a means of keeping faculty and students informed of current research and development activities, and to give the student experience in public speaking (GSH 16).

The thesis presentation is technically a Final Oral examination. The student may elect to combine it with the M.S. Oral Comprehensive examination on course work into a single examination, provided that the scheduling requirements for both have been met. This election is independent of whether to present the thesis publicly.

The student must be registered during the semester(s) in which the M.S. thesis presentation is held. Provided that no use of University faculty time and/or facilities is required, a student need not be registered in the semester in which the degree is to awarded, unless the thesis is defended and submitted to the Graduate School during the same semester (GSH 17).

Outside Review Option
A student who has written certain technical material in academic or nonacademic work may use this material to satisfy the writing requirement. The student should apply to the Graduate Studies Committee on Form CS-4. The relevant documentation should be attached; it will be returned.

Members of the Committee are normally willing to sign a non-disclosure agreement and read proprietary documents in confidence. Approval requires a two-thirds vote of the Graduate Studies Committee.

Documents may be accepted as satisfying this option only when all the following conditions have been met:

• The document is written in the English language.
• The student is the principal author of the document. If there are co-authors, each will be asked to acknowledge that the student did the bulk of the writing.
• The document has technical content and is approximately 5,000 words long (or longer).
• The document has been reviewed, evaluated, and approved for both style and content by each of at least two readers.
• The review process was such that the result of a negative review would have been rejection of the document.
• The review process was unrelated to this writing requirement.

Documents that do not satisfy this policy include: (1) term papers and project reports for UNC-CH COMP courses, and (2) papers written primarily to satisfy this option.

Comprehensive Examination
At the end of the M.S. program of study, students must pass a comprehensive examination (this is a Graduate School requirement). The M.S. Comprehensive Examination tests the student's mastery of graduate-level computer science material and supporting undergraduate content. The student may elect to take either a written or an oral comprehensive exam.

In the Department of Computer Science, the paper submitted to satisfy the Writing Requirement serves as the written form of the M.S. Comprehensive Examination. If passed, the Written M.S. Comprehensive Examination can also satisfy the Doctoral Written Examination, should the student choose to continue toward the Ph.D. degree.

The student may opt to take an Oral M.S. Comprehensive Examination. Passing an Oral M.S. Comprehensive Examination cannot satisfy the Ph.D. Written Examination requirement. The Oral M.S. Comprehensive Examination is a topical exam, covering the courses listed in the M.S. program of study.

A student must be registered during the semester in which the M.S. Comprehensive Exam is taken (GSH 16).

If the student passes the exam, that fact is reported to the Graduate School by the department.

If the student fails the exam, the Comprehensive examination may be retaken, only once (except by petition), after a lapse of at least three months. The student may elect an oral or a written form for the second examination independently of the form of the first (GSH 16).

If the failure resulted primarily from weakness in a narrow area, the second examination may be designated to cover only that area of weakness. For an oral examination, the examining committee will notify the student, in writing, of the scope of the second examination. For a written examination, the departmental Committee on Examinations will so notify the student.

Other Requirements
Residency
Two semesters of residence credit must be earned (GSH 15, GSH 7). This is achieved by the completion of 9 or more hours of course work in each of two semesters or by part time registration over a larger number of semesters. Transferred credit will not be included in the residence credit calculation.

Time Limit
All degree requirements must be completed within five calendar years from the date of the student's first registration in the Graduate School, whether in COMP or in another graduate program (GSH 18). As much as two years of time spent in active military service, the Peace Corps, or VISTA will not be counted, provided that the department and the Graduate School approve. Also, the student may request a leave of absence for a definite, stated time, not to exceed one year. If the department and Graduate School approve, the duration of the leave is not counted against the time limit (GSH 18). Full-time master's students who are funded by the department normally do not receive funding beyond their fourth semester.

If degree requirements change during a student's stay in the department, he or she has the option of continuing under the old rules or switching and satisfying all the new rules.

An exception to any rule may be requested for cause by petition. Decisions made by individual faculty members or by committees may be appealed to the department faculty as a whole.

The student must apply by the deadline to the Graduate School for award of the degree (GSH 13).

Summary and Required Forms
The following schedule represents typical progress toward the MS degree. The forms referenced can be obtained online or from the Student Services Manager, 135 Sitterson.

By the end of semester 2

• Complete 18 credit hours
• Submit Proposed Program of Study (CS-3) and Background Preparation (CS-1) indicating how each of the M.S. requirements has been or will be met.

Anytime

• Satisfy the program product requirement (Form CS-13).
• Satisfy the writing requirement.  We suggest that you complete this during the third semester unless you plan to write an MS thesis.

By the end of semester 4

• Complete coursework (at least 30 hours in approved Program of Study)
• Take the oral comprehensive examination (Graduate School form) or write a comprehensive paper (CS-9)
• Submit Application for Admission to Candidacy and Degree Card (the deadline for these forms is about one month after the beginning of the semester)

Just before you leave . . .

• Turn in office keys and access card to receptionist.
• Submit "Change of Address" forms to the Registrar's Office and the Payroll Office