Presentation Transcript

1. Choosing your Committee and Filing A Degree Plan using the Office of Graduate Studies on-line Degree Plan Submission System (OGS DPSS) Julie Wilson, Director Sue Bloomfield, Assistant Provost
2. WHAT is your “committee”? A group of 3 or more graduate faculty who serve, at minimum, to administer your final examination, but who, at best, can be an expanded group of advisors/mentors throughout your graduate study years The “chair” is your primary faculty advisor (you may have a Co-Chair, too)
3. WHY must you have a committee… Need an advisor to help select courses from the start and to decide which must be on degree plan Some programs assign temporary advisors 1styr Must have a committee in place to file a degree plan (all members must sign it!) …and by WHEN*? Most masters students must file degree plans by end of 2nd long semester Most doctoral students must file by end of 3rd long semester *check local dept/college rule on this
4. WHO is eligible to serve on your committee? All required members must be TAMU Graduate Faculty (can check for this status on the OGS webpage) Your chair (or, at least, co-chair) must be in the same academic program as you If more than 1 committee member (beyond chair) is required by your program, at least one member must be from outside your program/department Your committee can have extra members, but must have the minimum that required for your specific degree E.g., can include faculty who are not TAMU Graduate Faculty members on your committee as a “Special Appointment” (contact OGS for info on this process)
5. WHO should you select as your committee members? Your advisor may have suggestions (esp. helpful on finding out-of-dept member) If you are the one selecting: Faculty you have had for several classes Faculty you have worked with outside of usual classroom activities Faculty with research expertise that may prove helpful on your thesis/dissertation research, especially if this is different from your chair’s strengths Faculty who are informal mentors, advocates for you
6. HOW should you ask faculty to be on your committee? Ideally, in person (ask for a brief appointment) OK– by email Either scenario: Introduce yourself, your advisor, degree program and how far along you are in progress towards graduation Estimate your graduation date Explain why you believe this person would be a good committee member for you, especially if research expertise is important criterion How often will you get “yes” for an answer? (most of the time)
7. Once you are ready to file your degree plan, you should go to the Office of Graduate Studies on-line Degree Plan Submission System (OGS DPSS). ogsdpss.tamu.edu
8. Choose the student log in. You will log in using your Net ID and password through the Central Authentication System (CAS).
9. If you are starting the degree plan for the first time, select “Create new degree plan.” If you are continuing to work on a degree plan you have already created, select that degree plan.
10. Your name will be auto-populated with your official name on record with the University. Complete your address information. Choose your department. This choice will auto-populate the college. Choose the degree for which you are filing a degree plan. Choose the major. If you are a master’s student, you will need to choose your option. Once complete, select “Continue.” At any point, you can select “Save & Exit” to come back and complete at another time.
11. List all of the TAMU courses that you wish to include on your degree plan. Once you choose the Course Prefix from the dropdown menu, all of the courses within that prefix will be available for you to choose from another drop down menu. If you have any courses from other institutions that you wish to use on your degree plan, you will list them here. It is important that the course(s) is listed exactly as it is on the transcript. You will continue to add courses until you have listed all of the courses that you plan to take for this degree.
12. Important Course Information Eligible to be used on a degree plan: 300 and 400-level undergraduate courses; 600, 700, 900-level graduate courses (refer to TAMU Graduate Catalog for specific information on grading requirements) Transfer courses that are eligible for transfer (refer to TAMU Graduate Catalog Not eligible to be used on a degree plan 100 and 200-level undergraduate courses Courses that have been applied to another degree Transfer courses that do not meet transfer requirements
13. Most students do not have any prerequisite course requirements. These are courses that the student must take before they can take actual graduate courses to be used on the degree plan. These courses are not on the official degree plan.
14. Choose the role that you want the committee member to serve from the drop down menu (chair, co-chair, or member). Faculty are listed in alphabetical order by last (family) name. Scroll through the drop down menu until you find the person you want. Continue adding committee members until all are added.
15. Once a student adds all of the courses and committee members to complete the degree plan, the degree plan must be audited. Choose the degree plan button to begin the audit process.
16. From this screen, select the Audit button. This will take the degree plan through the degree audit rules that correspond to TAMU rules related to each specific degree.
17. This screen gives you more information about the audit function. Select “Audit.”
18. Once the degree plan is audited, you will receive a report of the audit. Levels of Severity: A Violation must be corrected before the degree plan can be submitted. A Warning must be corrected, but this can possibly be done by submitting an exception request for the degree plan through the OGS DPSS. A None is not an issue, but contains information that OGS wants to make sure of which you are aware.
19. Once a degree plan has passed the audit and the degree plan is submitted, the student must go back and actually hit the “Submit” button in the OGS DPSS. Once the degree plan is submitted, it leaves the student status and makes its way through the electronic approval workflow.
20. Electronic Approval Workflow *The student is responsible for the degree plan until it reaches the OGS status.* Once the degree plan is submitted, it generally goes to a pre-committee staff approver. Once the pre-committee staff approver approves it, is goes to the committee chair (and co-chair, if applicable). Once the chair (and co-chair) approve it, it goes to all the remaining committee members simultaneously. Once each of those people approve it, the degree plan goes to the department head or intercollegiate faculty chair. Once that person approves it, it comes to the OGS queue. Degree plans are approved in OGS in the order in which they are received. Each step of the way, emails are sent to the proper person to let them know that there is a degree plan that needs their review. If the person does not review the degree plan within seven days, another email reminder is sent. Any person in the approval process can reject the degree plan. If that happens, the degree plans goes back to the student to correct the issue. The degree plan must be re-audited and resubmitted and go through the approval process again if this happens.
21. Office of Graduate Studies 302 Jack K. Williams Administration Building Web site: ogs.tamu.edu 979-845-3631 E-mail: ogs@tamu.edu Hours: 8 AM to 5 PM Monday thru Friday Julie Wilson, Director jdwilson@tamu.edu Dr Sue Bloomfield, Asst Provost sbloom@tamu.edu