Contact Information
Dr. Jennifer Benning
Assistant Professor and CENE Graduate Coordinator
Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE)
Email: Jennifer.Benning@sdsmt.edu
Phone: (605) 394-2425
Office: CM 241
Faculty
Professors Fontaine and Kenner; Associate Professors Robinson and Stone; Assistant Professors Benning, Gadhamshetty, Lingwall, Nam, and Shearer.
Background Requirements
All SDSM&T Graduate College admissions requirements apply to the Civil and Environmental Engineering (CENE) Ph.D. program. In addition, a GPA of 3.00 or better is required, as is the Graduate Record Examination (GRE) for applicants except School of Mines graduates.
Students with a B.S. degree who apply to the Ph.D. program will be admitted to the CENE M.S. program until they have accumulated sufficient course credits for an M.S. degree. Admission to the CENE Ph.D. program is normally limited to qualified students who have already earned an M.S. degree in Civil or Environmental Engineering or a related field. Students holding an M.S. but with extensive undergraduate deficiencies may be placed into the CENE M.S. program until these deficiencies are remedied. Students placed into the M.S. under one of these two circumstances will be admitted to the CENE Ph.D. program after passing the qualifying exam.
Incoming students should have completed the courses presented below. Deficiencies in these areas must be remedied by taking the necessary coursework prior to enrollment in the doctoral program.
Calculus I, II, and III
Differential Equations
Probability and Statistics
Chemistry I and II
University Physics I
Statics
All CENE doctoral students are also expected to have completed the appropriate background courses for their intended research emphasis area (refer to the CENE Ph.D. Program Handbook: http://www.sdsmt.edu/Academics/Departments/Civil-and-Environmental-Engineering/Roadmap-To-Success/). Additional subjects may be required by the student’s graduate committee. These requirements will be documented as a formal component of a student’s Program of Study.
Qualifying Exam
All CENE Ph.D. students must pass a qualifying examination, normally to be taken within the first two years of enrollment. The “Qualifying Exam” is a course-work based exam to test and demonstrate the doctoral student’s proficiency in the foundational material of his or her discipline. A master’s student who proposes to continue into a doctoral program should so advise his or her major professor in a timely manner. Thereupon, the student will be given an examination by the graduate student advisory committee to determine whether to permit the student to proceed to the doctoral level of graduate study. This qualifying examination may be scheduled in the semester during which it is expected that 36 hours of credit beyond the B.S. degree, (which are deemed acceptable toward the student’s doctoral program) will be accumulated. The examination for the master’s degree may be used as the forum for the qualifying examination, at the discretion of the department/program. Results of this Qualifying Exam must be filed with the Office of Graduate Education within a week of completion of the exam. To pass the qualifying exam, the student must 1) complete all undergraduate deficiency requirements, 2) submit a valid PhD Program of Study to the CENE PhD program coordinator; 3) complete a literature search and paper on a topic related to the student’s area of concentration; and 4) present and defend the paper in an oral examination by the student’s advisory committee. The paper should reflect a sustained effort and culminate in an analysis of potentially significant research problems. The identified problems need not match the eventual dissertation topic.
Comprehensive Examination and Admission to Ph.D. Candidacy
When the student’s program of coursework has been substantially completed, she or he will undertake the comprehensive examination for admission to candidacy. The “Comprehensive Exam” is a wide-ranging exam to test and demonstrate the doctoral student’s readiness to pursue doctoral research. It includes a defense of a written dissertation proposal, and may also include additional written or verbal exam components to demonstrate the student’s proficiency in his or her field of study. It will be prepared by the graduate student advisory committee, with potential suggestions from any faculty member from whom the student has taken a graduate course.
The graduate student advisory committee schedules and arranges the written and oral examinations. Review of the examinations will be accomplished as soon as possible by all members of the committee. If the graduate student advisory committee and department head/program coordinator approve the application by certifying that the candidate has passed the comprehensive examination, the signed admission to candidacy form must be submitted to the dean of graduate education who, in turn, will admit the student to candidacy.
Satisfactory completion of the comprehensive examination requires that no more than one member of the graduate student advisory committee votes against passing. Upon satisfactory completion of the comprehensive exam, the student is then eligible for admission to candidacy. If the student passes with conditions, such as failure to pass a part of the examination, the committee shall inform the student promptly as to how and when the conditions may be removed. If, in the opinion of 2 or more members of the graduate student advisory committee, the student has failed the comprehensive examination, another such examination may not be attempted during the same semester. After failure to pass a second time, work toward the doctorate can be continued only with the consent of the graduate student advisory committee, the Council of Graduate Education, and the dean of graduate education.
- The comprehensive examination, and subsequent admission to candidacy, should normally be passed at least 12 months before the dissertation is defended. Results of this Comprehensive Exam and admission to candidacy must be filed with the Office of Graduate Education within a week of completion of the exam.
The written proposal should be no longer than 15 double-spaced, typewritten pages of text, not including the bibliography, figures, and appendices. Students should follow the general guidelines for the PhD dissertation proposal presented in Appendix C. If the student has not previously taken CEE 500 at SDSM&T, he/she is encouraged to do so to assist him/her in completion of this task. This written document must be reviewed by the student’s major professor prior to submission to the full committee. The full committee should receive the proposal two weeks in advance to the oral presentation.
The oral presentation by the student of his/her dissertation research proposal should reflect the contents of the written proposal and should last no longer than 30 minutes, without interruptions. The majority of the presentation should be a detailed description of the student’s proposed research program; background information should not exceed 20% of the allotted time. The originality and potential significance of the proposed research should be emphasized. Following the oral presentation, the student will be expected to respond to questions from the audience and attending faculty, after which the public will be dismissed and the student and his/her advisory committee will continue a private meeting to discuss any needed changes to the proposal.
The graduate student advisory committee schedules and arranges the written and oral examinations. Review of the examinations will be accomplished as soon as possible by all members of the committee. If the graduate student advisory committee and CENE PhD program director approve the application by certifying that the candidate has passed the comprehensive examination, the signed admission to candidacy form must be submitted to the Dean of Graduate Education who, in turn, will admit the student to candidacy.
Dissertation Submission Requirements
The dissertation is expected to advance or modify knowledge and demonstrate the candidate’s technical mastery of the field of study. The research results are expected to be of publishable quality. The student’s major advisor may specifically require submission and/or publication of one or more peer-reviewed journal articles. In lieu of the conventional dissertation format, the dissertation can consist of a compilation of published and/or submitted journal manuscripts that are derived from the candidate’s doctoral research and are either authored or co-authored by the candidate. Dissertations submitted in this form must have an introduction and conclusion to tie the journal papers into a cohesive manuscript. The final dissertation must be accompanied by an abstract of 250-350 words and the candidate’s vitae.
The dissertation is written under the direction of the major professor, but the student should seek guidance from all members of the graduate student advisory committee. Before starting to write the dissertation, the student is urged to review the thesis and dissertation guidance documents available on the Graduate Education webpage. In addition, the CENE department highly recommends Enjoy Writing Your Science Thesis or Dissertation, by D. Holtom, Imperial College Press (2000).
After successful defense of the dissertation (details provided below), the Graduate Dean requires that the graduate student’s committee-approved draft of the dissertation be submitted to the Office of Graduate Education by the published deadline (approximately 2 weeks before graduation) to allow adequate time for grammatical review, corrections and revisions. This draft of the dissertation, after all revisions recommended by the committee have been made, must be signed by the author and approved, signed and dated by all committee members, and the department head/program director of the student’s major department/program. The final unbound manuscript must then be reviewed and signed by the Dean of Graduate Education before any copies are made of any submissions for binding are done.
Dissertation Defense Requirements
The dissertation defense will be scheduled at any time after the student has completed the required coursework and after the graduate student advisory committee is satisfied that the dissertation is an acceptable manuscript, in terms of both technical quality and proper expression. A schedule of exam and defense deadlines is provided on the Graduate Education web page.
A final draft of the dissertation should be submitted by the student to each member of the graduate student advisory committee a minimum of 2 full weeks before the time and date of the student’s scheduled defense. The dissertation defense may not be scheduled during the period of university final examinations. The student will be required to give an oral presentation (30-40 minutes), open to the public, on the major findings of his/her research. CENE doctoral candidates are expected to present their dissertation defenses during the CEE graduate seminar series. An oral examination will follow the presentation, led by the student’s major professor with only the student’s advisory committee in attendance. The student’s advisory committee will question the student to test the quality and completeness of the research.
The student shall obtain and complete the appropriate form to schedule the defense, and in conjunction with the major professor, shall seek the approval of all committee members. The student shall return the form to the Office of Graduate Education no less than five working days before the defense date. The Office of Graduate Education will announce the defense to the campus community.
The student’s graduate advisory committee constitutes the examining board for the dissertation defense. The major professor will head the session. The major professor is responsible for ensuring that a majority of the committee, as well as the graduate division representative, is present. The defense will not be held if these conditions cannot be met. A negative vote by any two or more members of the student’s committee or a negative vote by the graduate division representative will signify failure of the defense, pending review by the graduate student advisory committee and the dean of graduate education.
Results of all written or oral examinations will be attested to by all committee members on a form furnished to the graduate division representative by the Office of Graduate Education. The original form with signatures and dates will be filed with the Office of Graduate Education and a copy with the department/program. If the student passes with reservation or pending correction, a copy of the form will be filed with both offices. The originals will be filed with both offices, with the appropriate affirming signatures, when final corrections have been made and accepted. If the candidate fails to satisfy the examiners on coursework or dissertation, written or oral examinations, the committee may schedule a re-examination over general background, dissertation, or both. The re-examination will be scheduled at the discretion of the graduate student advisory committee, normally 8 to 12 weeks after the date of the first examination. The student may petition his or her committee for re-examination prior to 8 weeks.
