Graduate Advising

The graduate program is listed in the catalog and linked from the programs page. The present page contains advice and information about which order to take courses in, etc.

Graduate Advisor / Who to Get Advice From

Each student has an official advisor who should approve your selection of courses. For most current students this is Dr. Abhyankar. You can also contact the associate chairperson of CS, and can get unofficial advice from other CS faculty and other students.

Course Sequencing

There is also a graphical representation of the program requirements linked off of the programs page (link above).

Note that CS 500 is not required for students who earned their bachelors degree in CS at ISU.

Students should choose electives so that (a) a total of 18 credits of 600-level courses are completed, and (b) at least 3 courses combined in 600-level Algorithms/Theory and Systems are completed.

Students in each of the concentrations are advised to take courses in the following sequence. Note that most courses are only offered either fall or spring, so you need to check Courses for when courses are normally offered. Your schedule will be slightly different depending on whether you start in the fall or spring.

Academic Concentration

• First term - CS 500 Programming Fundamentals
• First fall - CS 558 Algorithms
• First spring - CS 556 Systems Programming
• Spring after first fall - CS 658 Algorithms II
• Fall after first spring - CS 671 Operating Systems II

If the above courses are not offered when needed, we regularly approve the following substitutions. In place of CS 558 Algorithms - CS 520 Theory of Computation or CS 600 Concrete Mathematics. In place of CS 556 Systems Programming - CS 571 Operating Systems or CS 573 Computer Networks.

If you took either CS 456 or 458 as an undergraduate at ISU then you don't need to take the graduate level version.

Bioinformatics Concentration

• First term - CS 500 Programming Fundamentals or CS 501 Programming for Data Science,
• Second term - CS 557 Database Systems or CS 617 Databases, Data Mining, and Big Data,
• Third term - CS 618 Computational Biology
• Fourth term - CS 600 Concrete Mathematics

BIO 581 Genome Science BIO 587 Bioinformatics BIO 680 Seminar: Evolution and Genetics Culminating experience (BIO 692, 699, or CS 685, 695, or 699)

Professional Concentration

Students beginning the professional concentration in the fall are advised to take courses in the following sequence. Students should choose electives so that (a) a total of 18 credits of 600-level courses are completed, and (b) at least 3 courses combined in Interconnected Computing (602, 603, 609) and Data Management and Analysis (610, 611, 617, 618) are completed.

• Fall year 1 CS 500 Foundations of Computing, CS 600 Concrete Mathematics, Interconnected Computing Elective (602, 603, or 609)
• Spring year 1 Data Management and Analysis Elective (610, 617, or 618), Core Elective (60x/61x), CS Elective
• Fall year 2 CS 699 Internship or CS 685 Softwar Project, Core Elective (60x/61x), CS Elective
• Spring year 2 CS Elective, CS Elective

Advising Notes

Declaring your Concentration

All students admitted starting in the spring of 2020 will have the Professional Concentration declared by default. If you wish to declare one of the other declarations you should consult with your advisor and then complete your portion of the CGPS Change of Program Form. If you started before spring 2020, please get in touch with your advisor as well to fill out the form.

Policies and Regulations

Note that all policies and regulations listed in the Graduate Catalog apply to all graduate programs. You should read through the linked policies to be aware of them (you can skip the policies related to PhD programs and to theses since these do not apply to the CS MS).

400 versus 500 level courses

This applies if you did your BS at ISU. Note that you CANNOT count the 500 level version of a course if you have credit for the 400 level version of the course at ISU. For example, if you took CS 420 as an undergrad at ISU, you CANNOT take CS 520 to count it as part of the MS. Note that the registration system DOES allow you to register, and your advisor MIGHT not notice the problem, but nonetheless CS 520 would NOT count as part of your MS.

Courseload Limit

The normal courseload for master's students is 9 credit hours per semester (fall and spring); this is 3 courses since the courses in the program are each 3 hours. Some students choose to enroll for 12 hours in some semesters due to scheduling constraints. We do not generally recommend this, especially for students who are also working part time. Moreover, for students in their first semester at ISU or who are on academic probation, the department policy is that these students should register for only 9 hours.

Applying for Graduation

See http://indstate.edu/gradexpress/graduation-apply.htm for instructions on applying for graduation. One form that is required that is not listed there is a "plan of study" that lists courses taken for the degree. For the plan of study, please download and fill out the following document, and have it signed by your advisor: http://cs.indstate.edu/info/files/CS_MS_plan_of_study_template.xlsx. The form must have all courses taken (adding up to at least 33 credit hours) along with semester taken and grades earned. Please save the file with the name "CS_MS_plan_of_study Last, First.xlsx" where you replace with your last name (according to ISU) and replace First with your first name.

Internships/Cooperative Experiences

Students are encouraged to seek internships and part-time jobs related to computer science as early as possible in your education. These experiences can greatly increase your chances of finding a good job right after graduating. Note that students who are in the US on a student visa can only be employed off campus as part of a requirement for a course. Undergraduate students can enroll in CS 399; graduate students can enroll in CS 699. Contact the associate chairperson of CS for more information.

Application for Graduation Students receive an email at the beginning of term letting them know they need to apply to graduate if they will graduate this term. When they apply, an email with subject “NAME has applied for graduation” comes to the associate chairperson and graduate advisor. The email has a link to a form to fill out to indicate if they are on track or not (the link only works from on campus or with the VPN - see [1] for instructions about dealing with the form). You should check their plan of study and transcript to make sure it looks okay. If they have any transfer credit, it shows up in the total # of credits on their transcript, or the department admin can look it up.

Graduation - Pre-Check and Final Check For those applying to graduate you will complete the graduation checkout form (mentioned above) during the semester (the pre-check) and after grades are in (the final check). Plan on having a few hours on Wednesday after final grades are in to do the final check.

Other forms and information Other forms that the faculty advisor and graduate students might need are at [2] and
[3] and
[4]