Student Handbook: Second YearSecond Year Checklist: Course Registration:Faculty codes used to register for research courses (Genome 501, 600, 800) are now available online. Now that you have chosen your thesis advisor, you'll register for the following courses each quarter of your second year. You should sign up for a minimum of 10 credits each quarter. It's fine to register for more than 10 credits (up to a max of 18).
GENOME 600 is a variable credit course, so you will adjust these credits to be sure your registration is at least 10 credits, except for Summer Quarter when you should register for 2 credits (you may sign up for additional courses if they are vital to your research, but please advise the graduate program assistant). Insurance:US Citizens and permanent residents should decline the standard UW student insurance coverage while registering for courses. You will automatically receive Graduate Appointee Insurance Program coverage. International Students will automatically receive Graduate Appointee Insurance Program coverage but will also need to sign up for standard UW student insurance each quarter when registering. Please be assured that once the system recognizes that you have GAIP coverage, the standard UW student insurance charge will be removed. This cumbersome system is in place to ensure all international students at UW have insurance coverage. Outside Funding:All students should apply for outside funding. This should ideally be done early in your first or second year. Your own fellowship will look great on a resume and will also make your thesis advisor very happy... Funding sources include: NIH grants home page - the basic gateway into NIH grants of all types - has information links to forms, instructions, processes etc. See the left side of the page for 'types of grants', F series Predoctoral NIH fellowship (F31) detail instructions - review for the full scoop on how to complete these forms, what gets included in the applications, where To target your NIH search for funding even more specifically, check out the specific NIH institute that might support your work. Review the NIH roadmap (http://nihroadmap.nih.gov/) and then check out the NIH home page for institute list: http://www.nih.gov/icd/index.html National Science Foundation funding opportunities can be found at: http://www.nsf.gov/funding/ When to apply: Graduating seniors, prior to or during first year of graduate school, beginning of second year. Deadlines: Various deadlines depending on fellowship; see web site for specific deadline date and GRE deadline date. Ford Foundation Diversity Fellowships - http://www7.nationalacademies.org/fordfellowships/index.html Eligibility: U. S. Citizen or national with evidence of superior academic achievement (such as grade point average, class rank, honors, other designations); Award: Approximately 60 Predoctoral Awards at $20,000 per year for up to three years. U. S. Dept. of Energy (DOE) Computational Science Graduate Fellowship - http://www.krellinst.org/csgf/ Eligibility: U.S. Citizen or permanent resident; Students must be planning full-time uninterrupted PhD study at a U. S. University; Students in their first or second year of graduate study in the physical, engineering, computer, mathematical, or life sciences are eligible to apply for the DOE Computational Science Graduate Fellowship. Exceptional senior undergraduates who can meet all the requirements listed here may also apply. When to apply: Graduating seniors or first or second year graduate students. Award: Payment of all tuition and fees; Yearly stipend of $31,200; Allowance of $1,000 annually for research; up to $2,475 for computer workstation; renewable up to four years.
Community of Science - a search engine for all types of funding opportunities. The site has a search wizard that lets you refine your search to closely match the type of program and research you want to do: Many non-profit organizations are using a web portal for application submission called Proposal Central. This website shows a list of upcoming application deadlines, the sponsors, and provides links to the sponsors so you can find out more. https://proposalcentral.altum.com/ And finally, there is the primary federal application portal, grants.gov.
Asbestos Training :The UW now requires all staff and students to complete asbestos training each year. This can be done online in a few minutes at: http://www.ehs.washington.edu/pubcookie/train/asbestosg/index.shtm Establish Washington State Residency:Update 1/31/08: You will need to apply for resident status in your second year by filling out the application posted here: http://www.washington.edu/students/reg/residency.html. The verbiage on the website makes it appear impossible that residency will be granted. However, here's clarification from the Residency Office (unfortunately not posted on their website): "I know the website makes it seem if you take more than 6 credits a quarter, you cannot become a resident. This is due to the presumption you are only here for educational purposes. A student is able to overcome this presumption by obtaining all of their Washington legal ties within the first 30 days, plus having a fulltime job and financial independence. Although TA/RA's are on record as only working 20 hours a week, we are aware that these students typically work more than 20 hours a week. Therefore, we consider a TA/RA who has had an appointment for one year as overcoming the presumption they are here for educational purpose, thus they are allowed to apply (and usually obtain) in-state resident status." Choose Supervisory Committee:Your Supervisory Committee is comprised of a minimum of 4 faculty members chosen by you (including your Thesis Advisor). Your committee should ideally be in place by the end of Autumn Quarter, although there is some flexibility with this. Once you have your committee members lined up, please send their names to Brian Giebel so that he may set this up with the Graduate School. The Graduate School provides information on Doctoral Supervisory Committee roles and responsibilities. One of your committee members is the Graduate School Representitive, whose primary role is to act as your advocate in making sure exams are conducted fairly. As of April 2009, the Graduate School has greatly simplified the requirements for selecting the GSR. Specifically, Affiliate and Adjunct faculty members may now serve as the GSR. There is one important exception regarding Affiliate faculty members: if their primary appointment is via Genome Sciences, they may not serve as your GSR. For example: a faculty member based at FHCRC whose primary UW appointment is via Biology or Biochemistry may serve as your GSR. A faculty member based at FHCRC whose primary UW appointment is via Genome Sciences may not. Criteria for selecting the GSR include:
The GSR's role is to:
Please consider the following requirements when considering potential committee members:
The University of Washington Graduate School now requires all graduate students whose thesis research involves human or animal subjects to sign a form (http://www.grad.washington.edu/forms/index.shtml) documenting that they have been advised of human and animal subjects guidelines. Specific questions regarding these guidelines should be directed to your thesis advisor. Forms should be signed and returned to Brian Giebel (Foege S340, Box 355065). This form is now required, when applicable, as part of setting up your supervisory committee. Departmental Functions / Thesis Proposal:You'll continue to attend departmental functions, including Genome Sciences Seminars, giving a presentation at Journal Club, and Research Reports, at which you'll present your thesis proposal during Autumn Quarter. Committee Meetings:Committee meetings should ideally be held twice a year, approximately every six months, but at a minimum at least once per year. At least one of these meetings should be scheduled in conjunction with your Research Reports presentation. It is the responsibility of both the student and the advisor to hold these meetings. The role of the faculty members on the committee is to provide guidance concerning course work, constructive criticism on the student’s thesis research, and help in planning for the timely completion of requirements for the Ph.D. degree. Since it can be difficult to find a time which works for most of your committee members, you would do well to begin planning for this a month or two in advance. Follow this link for conference room schedules. Before each committee meeting the student should prepare a summary / outline of completed work and proposed experiments. This write-up provides a useful basis for the committee meeting, even if an oral report has been given recently. It should be 2-3 pages in length and needs to be given to the committee members at least three week days prior to the meeting. You should prepare a short synopsis (e.g. 15 minutes) to present orally in the meeting. This should be informal and should emphasize your data. Plan to describe what problem you are addressing, why it is important, what you
have done so far, and what you are tentatively planning to do in the future
(preliminary ideas for your thesis). Budget about an hour total for the meeting.
Listen very carefully to what your members suggest, and plan to take their
suggestions into account for your thesis proposal. After the meeting, the thesis advisor writes a brief report (this form is available online in fillable pdf and Word verions ) which is discussed with and signed by the student. One signed copy is given to the student and the other is placed in the student’s file. If you prefer, instead of using the form, the report may be emailed to Brian Giebel (bgiebel [ a t ] uw.edu). The student should be copied on the email. This report should include specific research goals for the near future that the committee members agree are appropriate. It helps keep those goals in clear focus and reduces ambiguity about decisions made at the meeting. General Exam:Successful progression into candidacy for the Ph.D. demands mastery of research approaches and relevant scientific literature. To this end, graduate students in the Department of Genome Sciences are required to write up the plan of their thesis research in the format similar to that required for federal grant proposals. This requirement is intended to encourage thoughtful design of an effective research strategy and comprehensive understanding of the relevant issues at an early stage of the overall research effort. You may expect your mentor to provide assistance with formulating the grant proposal. Your mentor will help provide "big" ideas and act as a sounding board, but not do so much that you aren't challenged. It is thus largely left to the mentor to use his/her judgment. The General Exam includes written and oral components and should be scheduled for Spring Quarter of your second year in the program. It is your responsibility to check with your committee members early enough so that your exam is not delayed (i.e. does not drag on into July or later). Please check with Colin Manoil if you are unable to schedule your exam for Spring Quarter. Please also be aware that noncompliance with with departmental requirements, such as timely completion of the General Exam, could result in termination of Training Grant support and academic probation. UW Graduate School Requirements for attempting your general exam include: - having taken at least 18 graded credits of graduate course work (approved 400 level courses are allowed) Follow this link for written exam guidelines. General Exam procedures have recently been simplified. Here's how it works: 1. General exams should be scheduled for late Spring Quarter (May or June). Check with your committee members to find a day / time / place that works for them. At least four members of the committee (including the Chair, GSR, and one additional Graduate Faculty member) must be present at both the General and Final Examinations. 2. Once you have determined a time that works for everyone, submit this request online via the Graduate School's new My Grad Program: Student View website. 3. Send Brian Giebel an email ( bgiebel [ a t ] u.washington.edu ) to let him know you've submitted your request, so that he may go into the online system and provide departmental approval. Brian will print out and provide the exam warrant, which your committee members will need to sign and return after your exam. Brian will then go into the online system to enter the result. 4. Students must provide the written component of their exam to their committee members a minimum of 3 weeks prior to the oral exam. If this deadline is not met, committee members have the option of asking to be removed from the student’s committee or requiring that the student reschedule the exam. Prior guidelines stating students must submit a thesis proposal to their committee in March and receive feedback from the committee by April have been discontinued. 5. Committee members may ask for revisions within 10 days of receiving the written component.
Travel:Please be sure to read through this entire section before making any travel arrangements. 1. Determine who pays: Please note that training grant travel funds can only be used while you are supported by the grant. They cannot be accessed thereafter. If your funding is coming from your mentor's research grant, your travel funds will need to come from that source. In this case, you do not need to check in with Brian - the person in your lab responsible for purchasing can make your travel arrangements. If for some reason it is easier for you to continue to have Brian make your travel arrangements, you are welcome to do so - just provide him with the lab budget number. The UW Graduate School also offers very limited funding: $300 for domestic travel, $500 for international. Please see Brian to apply. 2. Provide an estimate of all travel costs: We are now required to put all travel components on a single purchase order, whenever possible. What this means is that when you are ready to book your flights, please also provide an estimate on your other expenses to Brian or whoever is arranging your travel so that they may all be included on the same purchase order. This would include items like conference registration, hotel, etc. Meals, if not provided by the conference, will be calculated at standard per diem rates. 3. Book your travel: The department must pay for flights and conference registration up front. Please do not pay for these items on your own and then ask to be reimbursed. Once you have checked in with Brian Giebel (if your travel is being paid by a training grant) and are ready to book your travel, please follow the steps below. Please be aware that if you take personal time before or after the conference and this results in a higher airfare, you may be asked to reimburse the difference to the university. Contact the current agency of choice, Tangerine Travel (http://www.vacation.tangerinetravel.com/group+and+corporate+travel/). Please be sure to let them know this will be paid by UW Genome Sciences. Once you’ve been emailed an itinerary, please send this to Brian - or have the travel agent include him on the initial email - so that he may fill out the purchase order paperwork. To pay for your conference registration, provide the registration info needed (either to fill out a form or enroll online) to Brian. 4. Reimbursement: Please note that we will need a copy of your flight itinerary and conference schedule in order to process any reimbursements. Lodging and meals will be reimbursed after your return from the conference. Receipts are required for lodging reimbursement. If your lodging costs are higher than the allowable per diem rate, please include a brief explanation (e.g. it was the designated conference hotel, only place you could find space, etc) along with your receipts. If you are sharing a room, please be aware that this may complicate your reimbursement. Ideally, you should obtain a separate receipt for your share of the lodging, or at the very least, the receipt you submit should have your name on it. In a case like this, you would do well to consult with the GS fiscal staff before departure. Meals will only be reimbursed if they are not provided by the conference, and will be reimbursed at standard per diem rates. Since per diem rates are used, you do not need to save meal receipts. If you choose to skip a conference dinner, etc, you cannot be reimbursed for that particular meal. You will need to provide receipts for ground transportation.
Insufficient Academic Progress:You should meet a minimum of once per year (twice per year recommended) with your supervisory committee. If the committee is concerned about your research progress, they will suggest ways to get back on track.
If problems persist, your mentor may opt to put you on academic probation. This involves notifying the
If problems continue past this point, you may be put on final probation. Students are normally on final probation for one quarter only. After that point, the department will either recommend that you be removed from academic probation or that you leave the program.
First year students who do not reach faculty expectations in coursework or lab rotations may also be put on academic probation.
The Graduate School's guidelines are posted here: http://www.grad.washington.edu/Acad/gsmemos/gsmemo16.htm
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