|
Second Year Materials Science Graduate Students
January every year
B. Fultz, Option Representative
It is time to plan for your candidacy examination.
You should go now to the Graduate Admissions Office and obtain
the Candidacy Form for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy.
You need to list your five-member examining committee in
section I of this form. Notice that the choice of committee
requires approval of the Option Representative (Brent Fultz)
and the Division Chairman (David Rutledge). You should discuss
the committee membership with your adviser and Brent Fultz
before completing this section of the form. Arrangements
for the examination are partly up to you, subject to these
constraints:
1) Time: before the end of May
2) Committee of five faculty consisting of:
a. your adviser
b. three faculty from materials science (none of whom is your
adviser)
c. one or two other members of your choice
After your committee has been approved, it is up to you to
arrange a suitable time and room for the examination. Pam Albertson
will help with the room arrangement.
Before the examination, you need to complete section II of
the Candidacy Form, listing all courses in your Ph.D. degree
program including those you have not yet taken. Bring the Candidacy
Form with you to the exam.
One week before the examination, you should give each member
of the examining committee a brief (one page) description of
your research. At the same time, you should also send a memo
to each committee member and Pam Albertson informing them of
the time and place of the examination.
The examination will last up to three hours. The first 45
minutes will be devoted to a presentation of your research
results. The purpose of this part of the examination is to
convince the committee that you are capable of completing an
independent research project. You should rehearse your presentation
beforehand, and your uninterrupted presentation should take
less than 20 minutes. (With questions from the faculty, the
presentation often requires 50-60 minutes.)
The second part of the examination is devoted to general questions
that cover subject matter in materials science at the level
of your Caltech coursework. In principle, these questions will
be related to your research topic, but in practice this is
not necessarily so. To prepare for this part of the examination,
you should begin immediately a thorough review of the Caltech
courses you have taken, especially those taught by members
of your examination committee. You should concentrate on solving
problems of a fundamental character.
You will remember the details of your candidacy examination
for the rest of your life. We want you to do well. Be prepared.
|
