Conspectus of Requirements for the Ph.D
The formal requirements for the Ph.D. set by the Graduate School are: at least six semesters of tuition; fulfillment of the residence requirement (at least two consecutive semesters of full-time registration); passing of the Preliminary Examination; an acceptable dissertation; and a final examination by the student's Ph.D. committee.
These requirements, as administered by the Department and combined with additional departmental requirements, produce the following general rules of procedure, summarized chronologically below:
- Semesters 1-5: courses;
- Successful completion of two Qualifying Examinations (Reading List Examinations in ancient Greek and Latin for students in literature and history; one Reading List Examination and the Archaeology Qualifying Examination for students in archaeology). At least one examination must be passed by the beginning of the second year. The second must be taken and passed by the beginning of the third year.
- Students will also complete the German and French/Italian Qualifying Examinations by Sept. 1 of the third year (recommended progress: one by Sept. 1 of the second year, and the other by Sept. 1 of the third year). With the permission of the DGS, students whose research plans make it appropriate may substitute another language for French (e.g. Spanish, Modern Greek);
- By May 1 of the third year, each student will have completed the Preliminary Examination (articulated in a sequence of examinations outlined below);
- In the seventh semester, each student will submit a prospectus of dissertation research, which will be discussed formally with and approved by the student's Ph.D. committee. Recommended progress: first draft of prospectus to dissertation director by Sept. 15; submission of prospectus, approved by director, to committee by Nov. 1; successful defense of prospectus by Thanksgiving;
- During the second and third years, students will be required to contribute in some way to the teaching mission of the department, either as a teaching assistant or a grader in one of our larger courses. After successfully completing the Preliminary Examination, i.e. during the fourth through final year, each student will teach under the supervision of a member of the faculty, normally one course per semester;
- Submission of completed dissertation within two years (maximum four years) of completion of the Preliminary Examination. The final examination by the student's committee will take the form of a two-hour defense of the dissertation.
Departmental support is contingent on students’ satisfactory progress, which is defined as follows: students successfully complete exams and other requirements according to schedule; students avoid incompletes, taking no more than two in any one semester and finishing any incomplete within three weeks of the course’s end; graded course work averages above a B.