Requirement

-To get Master’s degree The requirement is to use some existing methods/codes to accomplish the analyses of some existing data. Developing your own codes/methods or taking your own observational data are encouraged.

  1. To stay in an academic career track : You will likely need one journal publication (as 1st author) if you would like to study abroad. Examples of such Master’s thesis works are these papers (Li et al. 2017; Ko et al. 2020). Without such a publication, you applications will most likely fail. To go to a domestic Ph.D. program, it depends on where you are going to; the requirements are different. The purpose of our education is to prepare you to be competitive, such that you can and should leave my group when the time comes. In most cases, you will NOT be welcome to stay in my group for over 2 years and continue with a Ph.D. program although exceptions can be made (e.g., if you have 2-body issues or any other specific reasons to stay in the same town).
  2. English tests : If you need an extra (paid) 0.5-1 year to prepare for the English tests (e.g., GRE, TOEFL, IELTS, etc) we can talk about that. Come discuss with me.
  3. To switch to an industrial career track : Please discuss with me what you need to accomplish before getting a degree.
  4. If you are not sure : Please discuss with me from time to time. But please remember that you are the one who is responsible for your own life. Try to make good use of your time.

-To get Ph.D. degree You are required to develop your own methods/codes, or come up with your own hypotheses and accomplish the test of those hypotheses. The minimum requirement would be producing one journal publication out of such works. If I think you can do better than that, the requirement may become higher (in such cases, your stipend may be higher too).

  1. To stay in an academic career track : It is safe if you publish at least 3 journal papers as the first author before you apply for a Postdoctoral position anywhere.
  2. To switch to an industrial career track : Please discuss with me what you need to accomplish before getting a degree.

-Thesis Timeline Please discuss from time to time when you want to defend. You need to bring up your final version of draft at least 2 months ahead of the defense such that we have time to iterate on improving it. You need to forward a revised draft to your thesis committee at least a month ahead of the deadline such that they have time to preview it.

-Course Works I do not care about your grades. Just passing them is fine for me. But if you think you need to teach any subject as a professor in the future, you better do a good job. Most of my colleagues express that they have no time (at all) to read any book during the 5~6 years of postdoc’s life. So now may be your last chance to prepare yourself.