Fall 2005-Summer 2009
Degree Requirements
Master of Science Degree Requirements
A total of 36 hours of coursework meeting the following requirements:
Background
Adequate background (as defined over undergraduate classes) is required for all students. A student can satisfy the background requirement for an area using 1 of the following options:
- Subject GRE in CS with score of 90-percentile; OR
- Coursework that covers the background topics through any combination of:
- Courses taken prior to admission
- Courses taken at UTCS with an overall GPA of 3.50 unless only 1 course is taken, in which case the requirement is for a 3.0 in that single class
- Final exam(s) of appropriate UTCS undergraduate courses passed with at least a B.
For the coursework option, the following UTCS undergraduate courses, or equivalent, are required as background:
- Architecture (CS 352)
- Operating Systems (CS 372)
- Programming Languages (CS 345) or Compilers (CS 375)
- Theory of Computation (CS 353) or Algorithms (CS 357)
Diversity
(See Diversity Courses for the list divided into areas)
1 graduate course from each of the 3 diversity areas (9 semester hours)
Major
7 additional CS courses (21 semester hours). See Course Requirements for more details
Minor
6 semester hours (typically two courses) in a minor: a supporting subject or subjects outside of computer sciences. See Course Requirements for more details
The Requirements of the Graduate School and Other Details of the Rules
In addition to these key requirements, there are rules, imposed by both the CS department and the Graduate School, that describe how these requirements may be satisfied. These rules deal with such issues as grades, courses taken in residence, transfer credit, and time limits. Every student should read these rules soon after being admitted to the Masters program and make sure to satisfy them.
A student may not apply the same course toward the satisfaction of more than one of these requirements. Each student's program of work must be approved by the Graduate Advisor.
Master of Arts Degree Requirements
The requirements for the Master of Arts degree (MA) are the same as for the MSCS with four main exceptions:
- A total of 30 hours of coursework is required.
- Major: Only 3 additional CS courses in the Major are needed instead of 7, and some details are different.
- 6 semesters hours of thesis work culminating in an approved thesis are required. Details.
- No CS 395 (conference) or CS 398T (supervised teaching) course can be counted toward the satisfaction of the M.A.
The following requirements apply to both the MA and MSCS degrees:
The Graduate School specifies a long list of detailed degree requirements in the Graduate Catalog 
that apply to courses counted toward a graduate degree. You should read that list and make sure that you satisfy each item. We summarize here the requirements that most often affect CS students.
- A maximum of 9 hours of undergraduate classes may be counted.
- A minimum grade point average of 3.0 overall is required.
- All degree requirements must be completed within a 6 year period.
- Diversity
requirement: 9 hours of diversity courses, one from each diversity area.
- Major requirement: additional CS courses as required for each degree.
- No more than 6 hours of courses may be taken on a CR/NC basis.
- To receive a Masters degree, a student must have been in residence at UT-Austin for two full semesters or equivalent.
The following rules apply to the background requirement:
-
Background requirements need not be satisfied with courses that exactly match the UT courses. We acknowledge that other departments divide up their curricula in different ways. The important thing is that approximately
the same material has been covered. The decision about what courses count
for what background requirements will be made by the Graduate Advisor.
- Any background requirements that have not been met at the time of admission must be satisfied while enrolled in the Masters program.
- UT courses that must be taken to satisfy background requirements may be counted toward the MSCS. degree (subject to some other constraints). They may not be counted toward the MA degree.
- Graduate level courses may not be used to satisfy background requirements.
The following rules apply to the minor requirement:
- 6 hours of course work in supporting subjects (e.g., Mathematics,Electrical and Computer Engineering, or Business) are required.
- The minor program must be approved by the Graduate Advisor. Approval of each minor course course should be obtained before you take the course by sending an email to the Graduate Advisor and listing the minor course(s) and explaining their relevance to the CS major.
- Upper-division undergraduate courses may be counted, subject to the constraint that no more than 9 hours of undergraduate courses may be applied to the degree.
- Courses may be taken on a CR/NC basis.
- No 395 (conference course) may be counted.
Note: Ph.D. students need their minor coursework approved by their research supervisor as well as the graduate adviser. The research supervisor can simply send an email to the graduate adviser with the minor courses listed and their approval.
The following rules apply to courses transferred from another institution:
- Only courses taken at major institutions within the United States may be transferred.
- Only graduate courses may be transferred. Courses designed for both graduates and undergraduates are generally not eligible for transfer credit.
- Only courses in which a grade of A or B was earned may be transferred.
- A maximum of two courses (6 hours) may be transferred.
- No course that counted toward a previous degree may be transferred.
- No
transferred course may be used to satisfy a diversity requirement.
- To apply for transfer credit, a student must submit:
- A petition to the Graduate Advisor. The petition will also have to be signed by the Dean of the Graduate School.
- An official transcript that shows the course that is to be transferred.
- An official explanation of the course numbering system that is used at the institution at which the course was taken.
- A copy of the course description taken from the institution's catalogue or web site.
