PhD milestones in the degree audit

2023-02-02

Shawn, Stephanie, Colette, and Denise met to brainstorm possible tools and procedures to facilitate accurate and timely entry of PhD milestones.

There are two main categories of milestones we defined:

1. The Big 3: Admission to Candidacy, Prospectus, Dissertation

2. Others: exams, papers, etc. required for Admission to Candidacy

The Big 3 are university requirements and are currently recorded in the audit.

Problem

Grad Directors don’t always receive this information for entry, resulting missing requirements on the degree audit.

Clarification

Are we required to record the Others in the degree audit? Colette said that CEP, if asked, would likely support recording all catalog requirements in the degree audit.

Added bonus

Recording these items in the audit would allow us to use the PhD to pilot awarding degrees based on degree audit percentage of completion.

Possible solutions

Develop calendar milestones to use as deadlines that guide timely submission.

Streamline the entry for Grad Directors.

Streamlining entry

Use SOATEST to record the Others.

Leverage Frevvo to write values directly to Banner for Admission to Candidacy and Prospectus (SHATCMT) and the Others, which will push to the degree audit.

We would use the same Frevvo form to capture the dissertation title, so this may end up being a manual entry by our office, but would create consistency in entry.

Next steps

Shawn to meet with Grad Directors to determine how we should proceed with mobilizing our tools.