Draft Minutes of The Graduate Affairs Committee meeting Oct 17, 2014

Present: Jacqueline Bermudez, Christina Christara, Stephen Cook (Chair),
Ken Jackson, Allan Jepson (Grad Chair), Peter Marbach, Bogdan Simion,
Ioan Stefanovic

Regrets:  Mike Brudno

The committee discussed Allan Jepson's Draft#2 of the document
"Summary of proposed changes to PhD checkpoint and progress monitoring".

After substantial discussion the committee unanimously approved the
document, with the following suggested changes:

There should be a clear distinction made between ``requirements''
and ``expectations'' for student progress.

The requirements include

1.  The Qualifying Oral, which must be completed before 16 months.

2.  Yearly Progress Review (at least every 12 months after the
Qualifying Oral).

3.  Thesis Topic, which must be completed within 36 months (48 months
for PhD-direct students).  This is an SGS requirement to achieve
candidacy.  The approval of the thesis topic by the PhD supervisory
committee will be done at a committee meeting (preferably a yearly
progress review).

4.  Departmental Thesis Examination

5.  Final Oral Examination (an SGS requirement).

The previous research proposal checkpoint has been replaced by the
requirement to have an approved thesis topic.

The thesis proposal is not a requirement, but it is an expected
milestone and can be the subject of the required yearly progress
review meetings.

Perhaps we should drop the word `checkpoint' when describing
the new program.