Graduate Studies

  • Current Students

Steps to Graduate for Doctoral Students

Advance to Candidacy:
There are University as well as departmental requirements for advance to candidacy; please see your graduate coordinator for more information.

Application for Graduation (form available online):
Students must apply for graduation the semester before they plan to graduate, please see deadlines. The Application for Graduation is now available online. To be eligible to apply graduates will need to have completed or be in progress of completing 18 units. Students should apply a year in advance of their intended graduation date. This form indicates what requirements you still need to complete.

Register and complete the Project Planning form in the Electronic Thesis Dissertation (ETD) system:
The registration process in the ETD system includes identification of the semester/year in which the student plans to graduate, submission of the student’s dissertation title, and classification of the academic program where the student is completing the degree.

The Project Planning form requires the student to select their committee chair and two additional committee members.  Students are responsible for making sure their committee members submit an electronic approval to serve on their committee.  In addition, the Graduate Coordinator of the program must approve the committee before the student can move to the Preliminary draft stage in the Electronic Thesis Dissertation system. 

The Project Planning form deadline can be found on the Graduate Studies’ website under Thesis/Dissertation and Graduate Project Deadlines.

Students who receive Financial Aid:
Graduating students are required to complete a “Loan Exit Counseling" session. Failing to complete the mentioned session will prevent the Office of Graduate Studies from ordering the student’s diploma.