Doctoral Candidacy Exam Instructions

All students participating in a Master of Science or Doctor of Philosophy degree program must complete a thesis or dissertation proposal for approval by the members of the student's steering committee. The major professor and each of the graduate steering committee members must approve the proposal using the Graduate School's proposal approval form. MS thesis proposals should generally be completed two semesters prior to defense of the thesis; PhD dissertation proposals must be completed to achieve candidacy (in concert or in parallel with the candidacy examination process). Each Department/Program may have requirements that exceed those specified broadly in this policy; however, they must be consistent with the Graduate School's requirements. Departmental requirements beyond the minimum stated here must be specified in writing and submitted to the Graduate School as well as listed in departmental web pages. It is the responsibility of the student to be aware of, and comply with, all Graduate School and Departmental dissertation proposal requirements.

The objectives of this examination are to confirm the student's breadth and depth of knowledge in their chosen field of study as well as the student's understanding of the scientific process. The doctoral candidacy examination should be administered upon completion of the majority of coursework, and successful completion of the exam signifies readiness to undertake the research and dissertation component of the doctoral program. This examination must be taken within three years from the first date of matriculation, and at least one year prior to the dissertation defense.

Upon the recommendation of the appropriate Department Chairperson, the Associate Provost for Instruction and Office of the Graduate School appoints the doctoral candidacy examination committee consisting of the student's major professor, the student's steering committee and an additional faculty member from an appropriate area. Additionally, the Associate Provost for Instruction and Office of the Graduate School appoints a committee chair who is not from the department of the student's degree program. The role of the examination committee chair is to manage the examination, ensure its integrity and represent the interests of the faculty and student.

The examination must have both written and oral components, described below.

The purpose of the written exam is to assess the readiness of the student to move beyond the coursework stage of the doctoral program, into the development of a substantial research project and dissertation. Traditionally, questioning should verify sufficient breadth and depth of knowledge to successfully undertake such research, and then communicate the results in a scholarly manner appropriate to the discipline.

To initiate the examination process, the examining committee shall convene at a planning meeting with the student. During the first part of the planning meeting, the committee determines the form and schedule for the process and establishes the date for the oral component (reported on form 6E). The student is then excused from the meeting and the committee develops and discusses the exam content. There are three alternative forms for the written component, as follows:

At least 3 business days prior to the oral exam, the major professor shall confirm with the chair of the examining committee that the oral examination should proceed as scheduled. The written exam is thus considered to be "provisionally successful." If the written examination component does not meet the standards established for the candidacy exam, the committee has two options.

The purpose of the oral examination is to further confirm the fitness of the student to apply the skills and knowledge acquired to date toward a successful and significant research project. The oral examination provides the opportunity for the student to demonstrate their ability to think synthetically and critically in a manner conveying their readiness to commence the dissertation project.

The oral component of the candidacy examination is typically scheduled for a period of approximately two hours, and is broken in to two distinct rounds of questioning. The first round, lasting approximately 60 minutes, consists of questions from each of the members of the examination committee, including the chair should they choose to contribute questions. Time should be shared equitably among the questioners, with interjections or interruptions by other questioners prohibited during the first round. The second round of questions may be more flexibly structured, with broader discussion and interchange among questioners is encouraged.

Any member of the faculty may be a silent observer for the oral component. The candidate may also invite a silent student observer to attend the oral examination. At the completion of the oral examination, the candidate and observers are excused from the room and the examination committee determines whether the student has successfully completed the oral component of the exam and achieved the status of "doctoral candidate." The committee chair has the option to vote. Unanimous agreement is required to pass the student on the first attempt. If less than unanimous agreement is reached, the student is considered to have failed the first candidacy examination. A student who fails the first candidacy exam may request a second exam, which must take place no more than one year from the date of the first examination. The second candidacy examination may, or may not include a new written component, at the discretion of the student's major professor and examination committee, in consultation with the examination chair. At the second exam, the student has passed if there is not more than one negative vote. A student who is determined to have failed the second candidacy examination is terminated from the doctoral program.

To schedule a doctoral candidacy examination, the student should complete the following steps:

Frequently Asked Questions

How is the passing score determined for each level?

To allow for consistency and ease of interpretation, candidates’ scores have been changed from a raw score (i.e., number correct) to a scaled score. Specifically, the results are converted to a scale that ranges from 200 to 800. Scores from 500 to 800 are passing scores. Your score report, which breaks down your numerical, scaled score, will be sent to you via email a week following your score reveal in CEPI Connect.

What is scaled scoring?

To allow for consistency and ease of interpretation, candidates’ scores are changed from a raw score (i.e., number of exam questions answered correctly) to a scaled score. Scaled scoring simplifies the interpretation of candidate scores on different certification exams. It enables the scoring of exams with different numbers of questions, difficulty levels, and pass points to be reported in the same way to exam takers.

Specifically, a candidate’s raw score is changed to a scale that ranges from 200 to 800, where 500 is the pass point. Therefore, regardless of how the exam difficulty changes over time (e.g., May exam versus the November exam), the scores are reported and interpreted in the same way. That is, a score from 500 to 800 will always indicate a passing score, and a score from 200 to 499 will always indicate a failing score.

Why are the scores scaled?

Scaled scoring is important because in order to maintain the programs’ accreditations, the exams’ content must be kept up to date and must reflect the current state of the industry. Doing so is accomplished by changing exam questions periodically to prevent candidates from taking the same exam repeatedly. Therefore, all of an agency’s exams change over time. With each change, the exact content of each exam is modified slightly. After each exam is updated, the pass point is assessed to see if it needs to be adjusted to ensure that only qualified individuals are certified.

Final Exam Schedule

For Fall semesters, there will be one reading day on Monday of the first exam week and one reading day on Friday of the first exam week. For Spring semesters, there will be two reading days at the beginning of the first exam week.

Final exams are scheduled by the Registrar's Office based on the meeting pattern of the class with the exception of certain basic course sequences that enroll large numbers of first-year students listed below. This schedule avoids direct conflicts for students and minimizes the number of students with more than two exams on a single day.

Any change to assigned final exam dates and time requires additional approvals. Undergraduate students who have exam questions should contact their four-year advisor. Faculty and staff who have questions should contact courses@case.edu.

The course sequences listed below are scheduled outside of the normal exam grid because portions of the sequences enroll large numbers of first-year students. The special scheduling of these exams helps spread out final exams for these students.

MATH 120/121/122/123/124/125/126/223/224/227/228