United States Graduate Programs
In many United States institutions the term "Prelims" is used for the preliminary examinations required before a graduate student is permitted to begin working on a doctoral dissertation. Depending on the institution, "prelims" may also be called "quals" or "general exams". Johns Hopkins University refers to the exam as "Doctoral Board Oral" Exam, or DBO, a change from the previous "Graduate Board Orals," or GBO, as it used to be referred. Practice in this regard varies among US Graduate School programs, and even among academic departments at the same institution. Some have a single examination or set of examinations, in which case they are typically called "Prelims." Other departments have two sets of examinations, one taken early in the student's graduate work called "Comps" because they are intended as a comprehensive survey of the student's overall preparation to undertake graduate-level work, and a later set known as "Quals" intended to assess the student's qualifications to undertake dissertation research. Typically a student who does not pass such examinations will be given one more chance. If a student does not pass on the final attempt, they are usually given the opportunity to graduate with a terminal Master's Degree. Some institutions require students to pass both a written and an oral qualifying exam. Upon passing the written portion, the student is required to select a committee of professors from their department of study, and this committee administers an oral exam. Upon satisfactory completion of the oral exam, the student is allowed to begin dissertation work, and that committee becomes the dissertation advisory committee.
In some university departments, graduate students seeking a Ph.D. degree must take a series of written cumulative examinations on the subject of their study in the first year or two of the Ph.D. program. These cumulative exams are often given on a pass/fail basis and a graduate student who seeks to continue in the Ph.D. program must pass a minimum number of these cumulative exams. After this minimum number of cumulative exams is passed, this degree requirement is considered to be met, and the Ph.D. student no longer takes these exams but continues work on other Ph.D. requirements. A student that has passed these testing requirements is formally known as a Ph.D. Candidate, Doctoral Candidate, or A.B.D., which stands for all-but-dissertation.
Read more about this topic: Prelims
Famous quotes containing the words united states, united, states, graduate and/or programs:
“The United States themselves are essentially the greatest poem.”
—Walt Whitman (1819–1892)
“There is no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe and there never will be under a Ford administration.... The United States does not concede that those countries are under the domination of the Soviet Union.”
—Gerald R. Ford (b. 1913)
“I believe the citizens of Marion County and the United States want to have judges who have feelings and who are human beings.”
—Paula Lopossa, U.S. judge. As quoted in the New York Times, p. B9 (May 21, 1993)
“In the United States, it is now possible for a person eighteen years of age, female as well as male, to graduate from high school, college, or university without ever having cared for, or even held, a baby; without ever having comforted or assisted another human being who really needed help. . . . No society can long sustain itself unless its members have learned the sensitivities, motivations, and skills involved in assisting and caring for other human beings.”
—Urie Bronfenbrenner (b. 1917)
“We attempt to remember our collective American childhood, the way it was, but what we often remember is a combination of real past, pieces reshaped by bitterness and love, and, of course, the video past—the portrayals of family life on such television programs as “Leave it to Beaver” and “Father Knows Best” and all the rest.”
—Richard Louv (20th century)