Degree Requirements

To be awarded the MS degree a student must (a) satisfactorily complete at least 30 units (10 semester course equivalents) of approved graduate credit, (b) pass the qualifying exam, and (c) write and defend a Masters thesis.

Courses and Study Credit

The 30 units (minimum) of course credit requirements are as follows:

1. At least 18 units (6 courses) of graded STA graduate courses selected from the MS course selection list.
2. At least 6 units (2 courses) of graded Duke non-STA graduate courses, and
3. At least 6 units of additional graduate credit (graded courses, ungraded independent study, and/or registered research credit).

All courses must be approved by the Duke Statistics DGS following consultation with the student's MS advisor. This may be done retrospectively if the student has completed some relevant Duke courses prior to admission to the MS.

In some cases, up to 6 STA credits (2 courses) of requirement 1. may be substituted by non-STA Duke graduate courses with substantial statistical content. Petitions for substitution, requiring review and approval of the STA DGS, will be considered on an individual basis. Pre-approved courses from participating departments are listed in the Course selection section.

All units may also be counted towards the student's Ph.D. degree, provided that they meet the requirements of the Ph.D. department.

Committee

Each MS candidate must have an approved three-member Masters Committee, appointed by the Duke Statistics DGS and approved by the Associate Dean of the Graduate School. All three must be members of the Graduate Faculty (rare exceptions may be approved by the Associate Dean of the Graduate School); one should be from outside Duke Statistics, usually the student's Ph.D. advisor or a representative of the Ph.D. department.

First Year Exam

Each MS candidate is required to take and pass the Duke Statistics First Year Exam. The exam, given each Spring semester between the end of final exams and commencement, covers the material in the Duke Statistics first year courses. For MS students, the exam need not be taken in the first year of MS registration.

MS Thesis and Completion Exercise

When the course and study requirements have been fulfilled the student must submit and defend a written Masters Thesis. The student may register for up to 6 units of ungraded graduate credit (STA 291/2 Independent Study, or Research) for work on the MS thesis topic.

The MS thesis comprises a detailed report on the project approved by the student's MS committee.The thesis must be a self-contained report covering aspects of the student's contribution to the project area: introductory material, summary of contributions and results, discussion of open questions and bibliographic material. The MS thesis may, in some cases, be a short and focused version of statistical work in the student's PhD thesis area, with additional statistical development; in other cases it may be based on a paper, or a piece of work that the committee views as potentially publishable.

The MS thesis and its submission must conform to the Duke University Graduate School MS thesis format and requirements. The student must present the MS thesis in an oral Thesis Examination administered by the Masters Committee, and must pass this examination as the Completion Exercise.