You should plan to spend 50% of your time in courses and 50% of your time doing research. Therefore, you should be registered for at least 24 units of 10-920: Reading and Research each semester. Once you have completed your core courses and electives, then your research units increase to a total of 48 units each semester. Once you propose, you should register for 10-930: Dissertation Research instead of Reading and Research. Register for classes on CMU's Student Information Online portal.

Adding/Dropping Courses

You can add or drop a class in your schedule until 10 days after classes begin. After that, you will need to see the Ph.D. Program Manager for help making adjustments to your schedule.

Changing Maximum Units

Send email to the Ph.D. Program Manager to request an increase in your maximum units if you are having trouble registering for classes.

Auditing a Course

Before opting to audit a course, you first need to actually register for it. Then, fill out the course audit form and have your adviser and the course instructor sign it to indicate their permission. Submit the signed form to the Ph.D. Program Manager for school signature and submission to Enrollment Services.

Any course at the 700 or higher level in SCS or Statistics (36-xxx) may be used as an elective. Any other electives must be approved by your adviser via email to the Ph.D. Program Manager. 

Presentation Skills Requirement

To satisfy the Presentation Skills requirement, students must give a talk that is at least 30 minutes long and invite members of the Speaking Skills Committee to attend and evaluate it. Be sure to fill out the speaking skills form.

Writing Skills Requirement

In order to satisfy the Writing Skills requirement, the student must be the first author on a paper. The quality of the paper must be such that if submitted to a major conference or journal it has the possibility of acceptance. It doesn't have to actually be submitted. The student must have a Review Committee of two reviewers: one faculty member from Carnegie Mellon (it may be the faculty adviser) and one Ph.D. student who is not a paper co-author. If the faculty reviewer is a co-author, they must explicitly indicate the student’s contribution to the writing. The Review Committee fills out the writing skills review form and must unanimously approve the paper to satisfy the requirement. If the student fails, the evaluators provide guidance on necessary revisions and the student tries again.

A machine learning Ph.D. student may waive the writing skill requirement if the student already has a first author paper accepted at a top ML conference/journal, since these papers already went through peer review. Accepted conferences: AISTATS, AAAI, COLT, ICML, KDD, NeurIPS, etc. Journals: JMLR. To waive the Writing Skills requirement based on this criterion, fill out the writing skills waiver form and send to your program coordinator.

How many courses do I have to TA?

You are required to TA two courses in MLD while you are in your Ph.D. program.

I TA'd in my previous CMU program. Am I allowed to count that for the ML Ph.D. requirement?

The MLD Ph.D. TA requirement will only count if you TA'd for a MLD course while you were a Ph.D. student at Carnegie Mellon.

When should I plan to TA?

You should not plan on TAing a course until at least your second year.

Can I TA for a course while also getting credit for taking the course?

No

How do I apply to be a TA?

Fill out the application form. 

How do I find a course to TA?

To apply to TA an MLD course, simply fill out the TA application form. We look forward to receiving your application!

Policy

If a Ph.D. student wants to attend a conference or workshop, the student's adviser or research sponsor should support the trip through either a research contract or a discretionary account. Student travel is unlimited as long as there is money available from research contracts and/or discretionary funds of a sponsoring faculty member.

If no such funding is available to the student, then limited departmental funds may be available upon request from the Machine Learning Department. Since departmental funds are limited, the maximum to be reimbursed will be $200 plus the registration fee, if only attending the conference or workshop; $600 plus the registration fee, if presenting a paper. Department funding is only available to the student for one trip per year and will not be transferred to the following year. This funding is only available if the adviser agrees with the student's decision to attend the conference but does not have the funds.

Process

To obtain travel support, the Ph.D. student and their faculty adviser/research sponsor must first agree that the student should take the trip. In advance of the trip, the student must fill out and print the student travel authorization form and get their adviser's signature before forwarding the form to the Ph.D. Programs Administrator.

The faculty member must (i) indicate the amount and the reason for providing partial support (be sure the charge number is filled in) or (ii) state on the Comments line that no funds are available from any research or discretional account. The student then submits the form to the Ph.D. Programs Administrator to request approval from the Department Head.

University Resources

CMU may also be able to help with conference funding and has a page devoted to information about conference funding for graduate students. Visit the university's Office of Graduate and Postdoctoral Affairs page for more information and additional resources.

To extend your summer internship beyond the approved end date, you must return to campus and continue your internship remotely and work only up to an average of eight hours per week. In the department, we consider this consulting. The dates of the internship must be within the semester dates. You need to do the following to ensure the internship is extended correctly:

• Fill out the Ph.D. student consulting policy and agreement form, have your adviser sign it, and send to the Ph.D. Director for approval.
• Register for eight units of 10-935: Practicum.

International students must apply for part-time CPT and register for eight units of 10-935: Practicum. You will also need a letter from your summer internship employer including start and end dates, hours per week and the rate of pay. Send the CPT form to your Ph.D. Program Manager for signature.

MLD Ph.D. students enrolled in our program and funded by research grants, fellowships or other funding mechanisms are expected to spend all their work time on academic activities toward completing their degrees. Outside paid work is not normally compatible with full time Ph.D. student status. However, in some circumstances the Machine Learning Department may permit full-time Ph.D. students to devote up to eight hours per week (averaged over any one semester) to outside, paid professional activities, where that activity is consistent with the student’s role as a member of the student body, and where that activity also enhances the contribution of the student to the university.

To obtain that permission, a student must apply ahead of time by filling out the Ph.D. student consulting policy and agreement form. The consulting start and end dates must be within the semester dates. Of course, the student must also make sure they comply with all applicable U.S. laws, including specific terms of their visa, if applicable.

International Students will have to contact OIE and fill out the CPT form.

You should complete all of your courses before proposing your thesis. You should also have satisfied the Speaking Skills, Writing and Teaching Assistant requirements before you propose. Discuss your plan to propose with your adviser for timing feedback.

The Thesis Committee should be assembled by the student and their adviser, and approved by the Ph.D. Program Director(s). It must include:

• At least one MLD core faculty member.
• At least one additional MLD core or affiliated faculty member.
• At least one external member (usually meaning external to CMU).
• A total of at least four members, including the adviser, who is the committee chair.

To learn more and apply for OPT, visit the Office of International Education website.

Once I have defended, how long do I have to turn in my final thesis?

If you are graduating in May and plan to attend the May commencement ceremony, then your final thesis has to be turned in two weeks before the May Black Friday meeting.

If graduating in August or December, you must have your final thesis turned in on the last day of the month following your defense semester end. If you defend in the summer, then your final thesis has to be turned in two weeks before fall classes start. If you defend during the fall semester, check with your Program Administrator about important dates throughout the semester.

The final thesis must have the approval from all your committee members and your adviser must send email to the Graduate Program Administrator as a confirmation of approval.

How do I submit my thesis?

• Before you submit the final copy:
  • Check research credits with Russ O'Lare.
  • Get a Technical Report number from the Graduate Program Administrator.
  • Check for proper title page format.
• When the final copy is ready:
  • Have the chair of the Thesis Committee send email to confirm the approval of the final thesis document to the Graduate Program Administrator.
  • Send the final document to the Graduate Program Administrator.
  • Complete the dissertation checklist and send to the Graduate Program Administrator.
  • Fill out the Survey of Earned Doctorates.

• Check that your diploma name is correct in SIO under "Graduation and Diploma." Students who fail to update their name before the diploma order will have to pay for a replacement.
• All August diplomas are mailed to graduates and are not held for commencement, so we need a valid (non-CMU) address to mail the diploma. Please check your address on SIO under "Graduation and Diploma." We do not look at the permanent address on the "My Info" screen.
• Diplomas will be ordered in the first week of September and mailed out in early October. The same timeline applies to Certified Electronic Diplomas (CeDiplomas). Students will receive email when their CeDiplomas are available.

Send questions about diplomas to uro-diplomas@andrew.cmu.edu.

• Discuss with your adviser what to do with any department purchased computers and let the Graduate Program Administrator know the plan. Send the asset tag number on the computer(s) to the Graduate Program Administrator. Usually you can take the computer with you, but we will need to retire it first so we don't continue to pay support charges for it. We can also retire it and have it picked up if you don't want it.
• Clean up your office and remove any personal items.
• Send the Graduate Program Administrator information about what you are doing next, including your employer, job title and start date. Let us know if we have permission to list your employer and job title on our alumni webpage.
• Connect with your Graduate Program Administrator on LinkedIn so they will be notified when you change jobs.
• Let your Graduate Program Administrator know an email address to use for the Machine Learning alumni email list. We send messages to this list with job openings, department announcements and party plans for conferences. We will remove you from the current student email list and webpage and move you to the alumni email list and webpage.
• Transition your SCS account to a CMU Alumni account.

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