1. You need to take CS 5014 – Research Methods in CS
2. We need to agree on a topic
3. We need to discuss and agree on who your committee will be.
3.1 For a thesis you need three total committee members including me.
CS grad handbook - "The composition of an M.S. thesis advisory committee must be designed taking into account the following considerations:
o The committee must have at least three members (including the advisor or co-advisors).
o At least two members of the committee must hold a PhD or equivalent terminal degree. Any member without a PhD or equivalent terminal degree must have recognized expertise in their field and have research experience.
o At least two members must hold tenure track or emeritus positions in the Department of Computer Science.
o A person from outside the university can serve as an advisory committee member with the permission of the chair of the advisory committee."
3.2 For a dissertation, you need five total committee members including me, and all must have a doctoral degree.
CS grad handbook - "The composition of a Ph.D. advisory committee must be designed taking into account the following considerations:
o The committee must have at least five members (including the advisor or co-advisors).
o At least four members of the committee must hold a PhD or equivalent terminal degree. Any member without a PhD or equivalent terminal degree must have nationally recognized expertise in their field and have research experience.
o At least three members must hold tenure track or emeritus positions in the Department of Computer Science.
o At least one member of the committee must be from outside the department.
o A person from outside the university can serve as an advisory committee member with the permission of the chair of the advisory committee."
4. Once we do this, the paperwork is pretty straightforward. This is from Prof. Chen.
"For thesis student advising, nothing special here except that you need to indicate on the POS that the student is on the thesis track, you are the thesis director and who the other committee members are on the student's thesis committee. There is no need to pre-approve the thesis topic. Submit the student's POS as usual through the submission process."
5. Develop a schedule for completion of thesis. Be sure to check deadlines for the grad school for the semester in which you plan to finish.
http://grads.vt.edu/academics/dates_deadlines/commencement_deadlines.html5.1 Proposal presentation - you will need to schedule a proposal presentation so that your committee can review what you are planning to do. Here is some info on what you need to have ready for the proposal presentation.
http://rmc.ncr.vt.edu/wp-content/uploads/2007/11/5-proposal-or-prospectus-formats.pdf 6. Take a look at some recent theses to get an idea of what a thesis looks like.
e.g.
http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/theses/available/etd-01052009-103100/7. Here are some hints for completing successfully.
http://rmc.ncr.vt.edu/forum/index.php/topic,61.0.html8. research defense - for a Ph.D. dissertation there must be a research defense.
9. final defense - Both a thesis and dissertatio require a final defense.
