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Defense scheduling moved to MyMichiganTech

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The Graduate School is pleased to announce that final oral examinations (“defenses”) can now be scheduled on MyMichiganTech. This applies to students scheduling a defense of their dissertation, thesis, or report.  

Students will log into MyMichiganTech to complete a scheduling request, and their advisor will log into the Workflow system to review that request and make a decision. Email notifications will be sent throughout the process. A student tutorial and advisor tutorial with screenshots is available on our blog, as well as a presentation in our seminar archive. A complete overview of the process to complete a dissertation, thesis, or report is available online.

A few things to note:

  • Students who have already completed their defense or have a defense already scheduled with the Graduate School do not need to repeat this process on MyMichiganTech.
  • Faculty will need to log into the Workflow system to approve defenses. Please refer to our advisor tutorial.
  • The Graduate School will continue to accept PDF forms this semester if a student has already started that process with their advisor.
  • Please delete any PDF forms that have been saved to use later. Always go to our website for the most current information and forms.
  • This process applies to the final oral examination, and not to other examinations such as a qualifying examination or research proposal examination. 
  • Graduate programs should remove references and links to the “pre-defense form” from their website and handbooks, as this process replaces the form.

The Graduate School would like to thank our colleagues in EAS for their hard work on this project. For any questions, please contact the Graduate School.

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Nominations Open for 2025 MAGS Excellence in Teaching Awards

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Nominations are now open for the 2025 MAGS/ProQuest Distinguished Thesis Award. Please submit nominations to the Graduate School no later than 4pm, October 21, 2024, following our online instructions. This year, nominations are being accepted from dissertations in the fields of:

  1. Social Sciences
  2. Mathematics, Physical Sciences, and Engineering

Michigan Tech may nominate one student in each field. Master’s students who have completed all of their degree requirements between July 1, 2022, and June 30, 2024, are eligible. The fields of competition for 2026 will be humanities and biological and life sciences.

Nominations must be delivered to Debra Charlesworth in the Graduate School no later than 4 p.m. on October 21, 2024. Please e-mail nominations to gradschool@mtu.edu.  Contact Debra Charlesworth (gradschool@mtu.edu) if you have any questions about the competition.

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2014 Graduate Student Research Grant Program

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The NCAA Research Committee is pleased to announce the 2014 NCAA Graduate Student Research Grant Program.

The NCAA Research Committee invites research proposals within the general topic areas of student-athlete well-being and college athletics participation.  Research grants are available for graduate students only and are intended to support the student while conducting research to be used for a doctoral dissertation, master’s thesis or external publication.  Awards for these one-time research grants are set at a maximum of $7,500.

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Reviewing a scheduling request for a final oral examination

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Students schedule their final oral examination (“defense”) by submitting information about their dissertation, thesis, or report and defense though their Degree Progress Checklist.

When a defense request is submitted by the student, the committee will be notified of the details and the advisor will also be notified to review the request in Workflow. If the advisor is missing the appropriate roles to review the workflow, the Graduate School will be notified immediately and will initiate updating the faculty record. Banner access for advisors is described on our web page. Please contact the Graduate School if there are any technical issues.

The advisor will log into Banner Workflow and select the scheduling request to review from their worklist. It is expected that faculty will review these requests within two business days.

Advisors will review the information provided by the student.

A portion of the form to show the scheduling information submitted by the student for the defense.

After reviewing the information, select “Approve” or “Reject” at the bottom of the page.

At the bottom of the scheduling request, select “Approve” or “Reject”

Return to the top of the form and select “Complete” to save the approval decision.

At the top of the form, select “Complete” to save the approval decision.

The committee, advisor, and student will be notified of the advisor’s decision. If the decision is to approve the defense scheduling, the graduate program director and assistant will also be notified. Committee members who are not Michigan Tech employees may not be notified; please confirm details with them individually.

If the committee does not receive the dissertation, thesis, or report with sufficient time for review prior to the defense, the advisor may request that the defense be rescheduled. Please contact the Graduate School to reschedule the defense.

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Fair use in academia

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Students who wish to use copyrighted materials in a thesis or dissertation must show that they have the ability to republish those materials.  One argument students can use is that their use is “fair use.”  This provision of US Copyright allows the reuse of materials if certain conditions are met.  Students sometimes think that all educational use of materials is fair use, but a recent court case illustrates that this is not true.

In order to use copyrighted materials in a thesis or dissertation, there are three simple steps:

  1. Determine if permission is needed to republish copyrighted materials
  2. Obtain permission for copyrighted materials (if necessary)
  3. Document the ability to republish copyrighted materials.

The Graduate School has helpful resources online, including a seminar from our copyright librarian.  Check them out!

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CGS/ProQuest Distinguished Dissertation Award – Summer 2024 – Xuewei Cao

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I am currently a Postdoctoral Research Scientist at Columbia University and Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. I obtained my Ph.D. degree in the Department of Mathematical Sciences in Spring 2023. My advisor is professor Qiuying Sha. Prior to joining MTU, I obtained a Master’s degree in System Theory from the School of Systems Science at Beijing Normal University (2018) and a Bachelor’s degree in Statistics from the Department of Mathematical Sciences at Heilongjiang University (2015).

My research is in statistical genetics. I focus on the development of novel statistical methods and efficient bioinformatical tools to find genetic variants or genes related to complex diseases and traits. My thesis title is “Statistical methods for gene selection and genetic association studies”. One of my main projects in my thesis is incorporating the genotype and phenotype association network to simultaneously analyze multiple phenotypes and multiple genotypes and improve the power to identify genes that are associated with complex diseases by using the constructed network. I also work on serval collaborative interdisciplinary projects falling in statistical genetics, RNA sequencing data analyses, clinical statistical problems, etc.

I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my advisors Professor Qiuying Sha and Professor Shuanglin Zhang for all of their valuable guidance and support through my PhD journey and beyond, and I am extremely grateful to the graduate program in Math Department for their constant help and generous support throughout my entire graduate school studies I also want to thanks to Dr. Kui Zhang, Dr. Weihua Zhou, and Dr. Hairong Wei for their endorsement and support with several professional projects in my thesis. Thank you all for your support and for endorsing this nomination.

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Introducing MyMichiganTech

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MyMichiganTech is a personalized website that will allow students to quickly and easily see their current student status. You will also be able to get direct access to Gmail, Canvas, banweb and more from MyMichiganTech – think of this as the first place to go every morning! The Graduate School is pleased to introduce it to you and looks forward to receiving your feedback on how we can improve it in the future.

Navigate to MyMichiganTech.mtu.edu and log in with your Username and ISO Password (just like Canvas, e-mail, or any other campus service)

Picture of MMT log in
The login screen for MyMichiganTech

The homepage has news, events, and weather. Click on the “Current Students” tab (outlined in a red box below) to show information about your current status. Depending on the services you use at the University, such as financial aid, or campus housing, different options will appear.

MyMichiganTech welcome screen.
MyMichiganTech welcome screen.

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Conferences: Do Not Hide Under a Bushel

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Whether you’re going to your first conference, or fiftieth, there are some great tips in this article from Tomorrow’s Professor to help you get the most out of the experience. A few tips on how to spend your time well at a conference, according to Christopher (2011) include:

  • Attend talks that will strengthen your specific research topics.
  • Attend talks that will broaden and enhance your research.
  • Learn how to have fun at the conference venue.
  • Interact with peers from other universities and organizations. Networking with your peers pays huge dividends. Peers today,
  • leaders tomorrow!
  • Finally, set aside some time to talk to potential mentors and some of the icons of the field. Most senior researchers enjoy interacting with graduate students.
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Lunch and Learn: “Graduate Fellowship Opportunities at the National Institutes of Health”

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In collaboration with Associate Professor Tammy Donahue (ME-EM) and Chair Jason Carter (Exercise Science), Sponsored Programs will host a Lunch and Learn on the NIH Individual Graduate Fellowship Opportunity–Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service Award NRSA.

The session is scheduled from noon to 1 p.m., Tuesday, March 15, in Memorial Union Ballroom A-1.

Graduate students and faculty will learn who should apply, what is involved in preparing an application, specific tips for writing a successful NRSA and an inside perspective on the criteria which reviewers use to evaluate applications.

This session will focus on an explanation of the different NRSA funding mechanisms, an understanding of the role of institutes in funding decisions, and how to determine if NIH is a good fit for interested applicants, or if NSF or others are better

Specific proposal development tips will be given on the four main proposal components: candidate qualifications, training plan, mentor statement and research plan.

To register for the event, see lunch and learn.

For more information, contact Jodi Lehman at 487-2875 or jglehman@mtu.edu.

Published in Tech Today.

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Keys to Graduate School Success

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In a recent article in Tomorrow’s Professor, the authors advocate that the three keys to success are:

  • Follow your passions and talents
  • Pick your advisor and lab wisely
  • Learn to write well

In the article, they expand on these ideas, and offer tips and suggestions to achieve them. One piece that particularly stood out to me is to “follow your passions.” Graduate school is challenging, but your goal is achievable if you lay a good foundation. One piece of that is to find a project that will motivate you even when the research is difficult and it seems like the project can’t be completed.

If you haven’t heard of Tomorrow’s Professor, it’s a great newsletter with tips and article for those pursuing or interested in careers in academia. It’s worth your time to read.

What are your keys to success in graduate school?  Do you agree with the authors?

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