CSE Grad Handbook - Advising
4 - Advising
4.1 New Student
Entering students must meet with the Director of the CSE Graduate Program for initial advising and determination of a Plan of Study. All direct admission students are required to attend an orientation session prior to the start of the fall semester.
4.2 First-Semester Adviso
The Director of the Graduate Program is the advisor for most first-semester students. During this period, all students should seek a research advisor. Students should customize the electives in the Plan of Study in consultation with their research advisor. The purpose of the plan is to identify all requirements for graduation and to aid in planning.
4.3 Research Advisor
Upon matriculation, students must become familiar with the faculty of the department and begin thinking about a research topic and a potential faculty member to act as a research and academic advisor after their first semester. It is the student’s responsibility to approach one or more faculty members and ask whether they are available to supervise the student’s graduate research and also act as a permanent academic advisor. The number of students that a faculty member can advise simultaneously may be limited, so the student’s first choice for advisor may not be able to accommodate them.
Students are not required to choose a research advisor who is a member of the CSE department. When a non-CSE research advisor is chosen, the advisor will carry the designation of “co-advisor” and a CSE faculty member must be chosen as an additional co-advisor.
Faculty members supervise research in an area of their own interest. A student may have to select a research topic that is not the one that he/she originally planned so that a match can be made with the interests of a CSE faculty member. It is the student’s responsibility to identify a faculty advisor.