Computer Science Graduate Student Newsletter

No.: 1996-08
October 1, 1996

Minimum COSC GPA Requirement

The MS rules require a graduate student to maintain a 3.00 GPA over all in all graduate courses and all COSC courses. In a recent faculty meeting, the faculty decided to make the enforcement of the rule more specific.

At the end of each semester, a student with a cumulative COSC GPA of less than 3.00 will be warned. After completing 12 credit hours, if the GPA is below 3.00, a student will have to improve his grade point average to 3.00 by the time he/she has accumulated 24 credit hours. Failing to do so may cause the student to be dropped from the MS program.

The faculty also decided to rename the non-thesis master degree from Master of Computer Science (MCS) to Master of Arts (MA). The degree has to be approved by the Coordination Board.

Dr. King to Chair NSF Workshop

Dr. Willis King was awarded a grant by the National Science Foundation (NSF) to organize the International Workshop on Computer Science and Engineering Accreditation.

The Workshop is an IEEE Computer Society initiative which has the co-operation of the ACM (Association for Computing Machinery), ABET (Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology), CSAB (Computing Sciences Accreditation Board) and the Educational Activity Board of the IEEE. UH's Computer Science BS program has been accredited by the CSAB since 1987.

The objective of the workshop is to learn the standards of CS&E education in various parts of the world and the measures each country takes to assure that the expected quality of the graduates is achieved. Fifty leading educators in computer science and engineering will participate in this two-day meeting.

So far 16 countries have committed to send delegates to the Workshop. Among them are Australia, Canada, India, Japan, Taiwan, U.S. and ten other European and Latin American countries. Dr. Willis King is the organizer and the chairman of the Workshop to be held in Salt Lake City, Utah on Nov. 10-11, 1996.

COSC Graduate Enrollment Up

According to the data released by the College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, the enrollment for Computer Science graduate students is up significantly this Fall. There are 294 students (180 MS and 114 Ph.D.) enrolled which makes up more than 40% of the graduate student population in the College. The graduate enrollment was 218 for Fall 95 and 267 for Fall 94.

Letter from the Advisor

My term as the COSC Director of Graduate Studies expires at the end of the semester (December 96). I'll go back to my regular teaching and research duties starting January 1, 1997.

By the end of the year, I'll have served four years as the Graduate Advisor. I enjoyed working with our graduate students over the years and will miss some aspects of my job.

Dr. Lennart Johnsson, COSC Chairman, will nominate a new Director to be approved by the faculty in the next few weeks. I'll continue to publish this newsletter until the end of the semester.

I would like to wish you a successful career.

Stephen Huang

QE Sign-Up Starts October 1

Students can sign up for the qualifying examination starting October 1. The four areas offered this semester are: Numerical Analysis, Artificial Intelligence, Theory of Computation, and Computer Architecture. The deadline for signing up for this year's QE's is November 20.