Most of the students at the AI lab are part of the EECS Department (or course 6 in MIT lingo). Course 6 is divided into 6 areas and computer science falls under area II. The Area II web site lists the current and past degree requirements. Students in other departments must complete different requirements. Those can be found though the web pages of that department.

As graduate students in area II, there are a number of requirements we must meet before receiving our Ph.D. Firstly, we must complete a Masters of Science either before or during our time here. Most students do not enter with a Masters and hense must complete the following:

• Course Work — Courses are divided into three categories: Systems, Theory, AI. To complete a Masters, we must take three core classes covering at least two different areas. (not all classes fall into an area) A listing of course 6 classes can be found in the course catalog.
• Masters Thesis — Most of the work for a Masters is spent on the thesis research. A Masters thesis is not as large as a Ph.D. thesis, yet requires some original work. It is hard to describe what constitutes a Masters Thesis. The best way is to look at some examples.

After the Masters (usually it takes two years), we must complete the following additional requirements to secure a Ph.D. These requirements have been recently changed, and here are the new requirements: (the summary of old requirements--an older version of this page--resides here)

• Technical Qualifying Exam (TQE) — As the first step, each student must take 4 TQE courses (and get A's) or pass the TQE exams (or a combination of courses and exams). More details, including the list of approved TQE courses and exams can be found in the new Area II roadmaps. Many students who enter without a master's degree will take the TQE courses to fulfill both the TQE requirement and the M.S. course requirement.
• Research Qualifying Exam (RQE) — In addition, each student needs to prove that he/she is capable of carrying out research. This is done by presenting a conference-style paper (usually from master's research) and giving an oral presentation of 20 minutes to a three-person RQE committee.
• Additional Course Work — In addition to the courses above, we may need to take more (up to two) courses as recommended by the student's Doctoral committee.
• Minor — As part of the Ph.D. program, we must complete a minor program. The minor is defined to be two courses in a different field than our field of study. The two courses should form a "cohesive program of study." Popular minors include neuro-biology and mathematics.
• Teaching Assistant (TA) — Each student must TA once as approved by the Doctoral committee.
• Thesis — Finally, most of the work is spent on research leading up to the production of a Ph.D. Thesis. (more on the thesis).

As can be seen from above, this program of study differs from that of many other schools or disciplines where two or three years of solid coursework is followed by a research and a thesis. In the AI lab, students start research as soon as they arrive. Most students take two courses each semester for the first few years in conjunction with their research efforts.

Sidenote to current members of the lab: These pages are in constant need of updating and correction. In particular it is important that they don't just represent my opinions. So please, e-mail me at aoh or just change the pages if you see something that needs "help."