PL-FM-SE General Qualifying Exam Process
The PL-FM-SE qual exam is a 2-hour oral exam where a candidate is required to present two research papers in the area. The list of papers is not published beforehand and is usually determined before your qualifying exam. The two papers could be fundamental papers or contemporary papers (from recent conferences). The papers are not unique, students taking the qual during the same semester could end up with the same papers.
Before the Qualifying Exam Process
- Send in qualifying exam statement the semester before (by the published deadline). This should include information about your advisor, your research area(s), and a brief description of your research interests. The qual committee would try and select papers that best fit your research description; however, this might not always be the case.
- About a month prior to the actual qualifying exam, you will receive a brief email telling you the date of your exam, who on your committee (and the chair of the committee), and the two papers that you will be asked to present during the oral exam.
- Here are some qual tips from previous students in PL-FM-SE.
During the Qualifying Exam Process
- You will be asked to present both papers. The order of the papers is usually determined by you; however, the committee could decide to switch the order.
- Each presentation should not exceed 30 minutes. During the presentation, the qual committee is free to interject and ask questions. These questions could test your background knowledge about the fundamental CS topics, seek clarification on the papers that you have presented, ask for your own opinions on the strengths and weaknesses of the paper, ask for suggestions on how to apply the paper to your own research, etc.
- You are free to use the whiteboard in the room or any other medium to answer the questions or explain yourself more clearly.
- The qualifying exam is meant to test how well you are able to assimilate the ideas in the papers and apply them to your own research. The committee is not looking for a perfect "regurgitation" of the paper itself; rather, they focus on your educated opinions about the paper. You should aim to impress the committee with your understanding and opinions of the papers.
After the Qualifying Exam Process
- You will be asked to leave the room while the qual committee makes their decision.
- About two weeks later, you will receive a letter in your CS departmental mailbox with your results. If you have a conditional pass, the committee will specify what you need to do next. If you failed the exam for the first time, you will have the opportunity to re-take the qualifying exam the next semester.