Admission-to-Candidacy (ACE) Exam
Students MUST take the Admission-to-Candidacy Exam (ACE) by March 1st of their second year. The ACE Examining Committee consists of five individuals: a chairperson, the students three-person Special Committee and one additional examiner to be selected by the student and approved by the Program Director.
The objective of the Admission-to-Candidacy examination is to affirm that the student has attained the breadth of knowledge commensurate with the high standards of the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy; and that the student is ready to undertake full-time thesis research.
The Admission to Candidacy Examination (ACE) consists of two parts: written and oral. For the written part, the student crafts a research proposal that poses and tests a novel hypothesis, in a subject area that can relate to the student’s intended thesis research (effective July 1, 2009). The selected hypothesis is expected to be creative, insightful and testable by an experimental plan devised by the student. The proposed experiments should be of a magnitude and scope suitable for a fellowship application, i.e. realistic for completion by one graduate student in a 2-3 year time frame. Once the ACE topic is approved, the student is free of all responsibility to the thesis lab and given one month to work on the written proposal. Once the written component of the ACE has been prepared by the candidate, and before the rest of the ACE committee receive the written portion, the PI must sign off on it, indicating that it is the candidate's own work, and that it includes the candidate's own novel ideas or hypotheses. An email to this effect to the Program Director, cc'ed to the Program Coordinator, will suffice. The text is limited to 15 typewritten pages (excluding references) in a 12 point font. The student distributes the written proposal to each member of their Special Committee. The faculty members of the Special committee must approve the written ACE, and provide details of any necessary corrections, before the oral exam can proceed. The student then incorporates any necessary corrections to their written proposal and distributes it to the entire ACE committee. At this time, the student schedules the oral exam approximately two weeks later. The oral exam is intended to test the student's factual knowledge as well as his/her ability to process, organize, and evaluate scientific data.
The student is required to complete the following form and deliver it to the Graduate Program Coordinator (who will deliever it to the Graduate School office) at least two weeks prior to the due date of the written portion of the exam (and at least four weeks prior to the date of the oral portion of the exam).
