The Graduate Council recently approved the establishment of a new course, GRAD 7800/9800 – Full-time Enrollment for Research. This course is now an option for graduate students completing their thesis or dissertation research. Students who have completed all required credit and passed all milestones except the defense are eligible to enroll.
This 3-credit course can be used to elevate the qualifying student to full-time enrollment. Not all graduate students need full-time status, but some do for financial aid purposes or for visa purposes. Tuition and fees paid for this course more accurately reflect the resources students access during this phase of research.
Students working toward their defense should use this course and not the 1-credit residency course, GRAD 7999/9999. That course (GRAD 7999/9999) should be requested only when a student misses the deadline to defend the thesis/dissertation in one semester and must defend in the first four weeks of the next semester to graduate. That student is using few university resources and simply needs to be registered to graduate. When more thesis or dissertation work is needed, the new GRAD 7800/9800 course is appropriate.
When considering whether to request a permit for GRAD 7999/9999, Graduate Program Directors should work with the student to determine whether he or she can schedule a realistic defense date in the first four weeks of the semester. If not, the student should register for GRAD 7800/9800.
Permits are required for both GRAD 7800/9800 and GRAD 7999/9999. Catalog descriptions are available here: 2017/18 Graduate Catalog, GRAD Courses.
It’s difficult to anticipate all the consequences of instituting a policy change, so please help us by sharing your comments in the box below. We want to be sensitive to unique circumstances, but we also want tuition and fee structures to reflect accurately the investment our university is making in our graduate students.
