A student can earn graduate credit for a course if the course is a graduate-level (6000 or above) course, or if it is an upper-division undergraduate course that has been approved for graduate credit (5000-level). Graduate credit can be earned whether or not the student has been admitted to the Graduate School, but in most cases a student who has not yet been admitted to the Graduate School will have to transfer the credits in to his/her graduate career after official admission to the Graduate School. In such cases, rules governing Transfer of Credit will apply.
Undergraduate students and graduate students in either a Temporary or Non-Degree status may take 5000-level courses. Once they are ultimately admitted to degree status in the Graduate School, those courses must formally be transferred into their graduate programs by using the Transfer of Credit form. In such cases, the following requirements apply:
- The course(s) must be appropriate to the graduate degree,
- A grade of “B” or higher must have been earned in each course to be transferred in, and
- A limited number of credits may be transferred in to a master’s degree program, as specified in the Transfer of Credit policy.
Additionally, the six-year period that each student has to complete his/her graduate degree begins with the date of the earliest course that will count towards completion of the degree requirements. If a student were to transfer in a course that was taken, for example, two years before his/her official admission to the Graduate School, the six-year clock would start with the date of that transfer course.
In all cases in which a 5000 level course is used to complete the requirements of a graduate degree, the student must notify the instructor of the course that the course is being taken for graduate credit. In such instances, the professor is expected to require additional work of the student to justify making the course a graduate-level course. This is done by use of the Graduate Credits Requested for Undergraduate Course form, which can be found on the Graduate School’s forms website.
The declaration of taking an undergraduate course for graduate credit must be made in advance of taking the course. In no case will such credit be granted after the fact.
Graduate students who take an upper-division undergraduate course and who do not want to receive graduate credit for it, and who do not intend to use it towards completion of the graduate degree requirements, should register for the 4000-level version of the course.