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Comprehensive Exam
Comprehensive Examination for Ph.D. candidacy (2003 and later)
The Department of Molecular Pharmaceutics administers two major exams required of all Ph.D. students, the Comprehensive Exam and the Qualifying Exam.
- I. Comprehensive Exam Requirements and Scheduling
- II. Comprehensive Exam Topics
- III. Comprehensive Exam Procedures
- IV. Comprehensive Exam Grading
- V. Qualifying Exam Procedures
- Pass
- Conditional Pass
- Failure
All students are required to take the department's written comprehensive examination within six months of completing their department core courses. The comprehensive exam(s) for a given core course(s) must be completed within three weeks of the end of the semester in which the course was offered. This deadline is generally not flexible but can be changed under extenuating circumstances (e.g., if one or more core courses are cancelled within a given academic year due to insufficient enrollment) with Department chair’s approval.
Students will be evaluated for their written performance and demonstrated advanced profiency on questions relating to relevant topics in the field and core content including:
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Physical chemistry, physical pharmacy and dosage forms, including solvent theory, equilibria, thermodynamics, mass transport, colloids and surface science
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Physical organic and polymer chemistry, chemical kinetics and reaction mechanisms
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Drug delivery, including targeting, internalization and intracellular trafficking
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Pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics
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Pharmaceutical Biotechnology
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Appropriate pharmaceutical characterization and analytical methods
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Appropriate data handling, statstical methods and experimental design
There will be one question for each of the core Pharmaceutics core courses (PHCEU 7010, 7011, 7020, 7021, 7030 & 7040). Questions will be written and graded by Department faculty members selected by the Chair or exam coordinator. Students are required to submit their own independently worked electronic file responses to the exam questions as separate, clearly identified .pdf file answers to each exam question. These should be computer-generated (text-typed, equation-edited, but not hand-written and scanned) documents. Students have three days to answer each question (e.g., a total of six days for 2 questions) from the date of exam distribution to the exam coordinator in the department. A student-named electronic folder containing all .pdf-generated answer files with identifiers linked to each submitting student can be conveyed to the Department Graduate Program Coordinator via the Comprehensive Exam canvas course using a filename format such as “STUDENT_NAME_PHCEU7020.pdf” for each answer submission. No paper hardcopies of answers are accepted for exam answers (note: all photocopying required for any exam needs is not done at department expense). No answer revisions will be accepted after the submission deadline. Students are expected to conform to all policies regarding academic honesty and integrity in producing their answers: essentially that all work submitted is their own with all external supporting materials and resources clearly cited in the exam answers. Each submitted answer file will be reviewed by Turnitin for originality of writing and possible use of AI. If either is at an unacceptable level, students will be asked to rewrite the answer file.
Faculty will have three weeks from the date the exam answers are received to grade them. Grading of each question will be on a scale of 0-100, with a score of 80 considered to be a minimum passing score for each question. Results will be conveyed to the student in writing by the exam coordinator. Students may appeal the grading of a particular question. In such cases, three faculty members (other than those who wrote the question) will be selected by the exam coordinator to re-grade the question being challenged.
Students passing all written questions will receive an unconditional pass for the comprehensive exam.
Students failing to pass one or two of six cumulative written questions will receive a conditional pass for the comprehensive exam and will have one month to submit correct answer(s). The faculty will then have one month from the date that the revised answers were submitted to re-evaluate them. Failure to answer one or two questions correctly in the resubmission, or missing any deadlines, will require the student to repeat the entire comprehensive exam at the next scheduled date. The second comprehensive exam will be the final opportunity to pass this requirement.
Students failing to pass three questions will fail the comprehensive exam. These students will be required to repeat the entire comprehensive exam at the next scheduled exam date. The second comprehensive exam will be final.
Students who fail the second exam are no longer eligible to continue in the doctoral program.
TO SCHEDULE YOUR QUALIFYING EXAM, PLEASE COMPLETE THIS FORM.
To advance to Ph.D. candidacy, all students must pass a qualifying examination that consists of both an original written research proposal and an oral examination by their supervisory committee. This must be completed within one year of passing the comprehensive exam. This deadline is generally not flexible but can be changed under extenuating circumstances with Department chair’s approval. Circumstances including a sudden radical change of research support or project theme could justify such a change. The student should consult first with their research advisor to confirm a suitable topic for their research proposal. The research proposal topic may be based on either (1) their own research but with new aims not proposed by or originating from their advisor (see below), or (2) new original pharmaceutically relevant research (not previously submitted for funding by anyone) that falls within the broad categories listed above (under comprehensive exam topics, see Section VII.B.).
The written research proposal will be evaluated for content, significance, accuracy, technical proficiency, and maturity by a qualifying exam committee comprising four faculty from the student’s supervisory committee, but not the student’s research advisor. The supervisory committee shall select one of these four as the chair of the qualifying exam committee at the time of the oral examination. Committee member substitutions are allowed at the discretion of the department chair.
The student’s research proposal should follow the NIH's current format for submitting an F31 grant application. Refer to this page for detailed instructions on preparing your research proposal.
Students who receive a pass will advance to Ph.D. candidacy. No further work will be required - the student has completed the exam in full. The committee must unanimously agree upon a pass.
Students judged to be deficient in certain areas of the proposal and/or the oral examination committee will receive a conditional pass and will have 4 weeks from the date of issue of their committee's proposal defense evaluation letter to correct deficiencies in the proposal and/or fulfill other requirements as stipulated by the committee. Students may solicit feedback from their committee members and advisor while revising their proposal. The revised proposal should include an introduction section that details specific changes made in the revised proposal (see PHS form 398 for detailed instructions). The revised proposal should be submitted to both committee members and the department office on or before the 4-week deadline. This submission will be final (i.e., subsequent revisions will not be considered). Committee members will then have 3 weeks to review and judge the revised proposal. Un-reviewed proposals will automatically receive a pass. The final decision (pass or fail) will be decided by a majority of the committee. In case of a split vote, the committee chair will make the final decision. In the event of failure, or if the student's 4-week resubmission deadline is missed, the student will have one more opportunity to retake the exam.
Students who fail the preliminary exam will be required to submit and defend a new research proposal. The second submission will be final. The due date of the second submission is at the discretion of the committee, but no longer than 6 months from the date of the original proposal examination date.