Admissions

Graduate Status | Provisional Status | Temporary Status | Apply | Deadlines | Check Application Status | Non-U.S. Citizens | BS+MS Program

Admission to Graduate Study

An undergraduate degree is the minimal requirement for admission to graduate study. Students are admitted to a graduate program and granted one of the following three types of status:

1. Full graduate status: when all admission requirements are met;
2. Provisional graduate status: when some admission requirements are not (or inadequately) met;
3. Temporary graduate status: to take specific graduate-level courses for one term.

All students, except those with temporary status, must apply either to the MS program or to the PhD program. Students admitted to the MS program are eligible to complete the requirements for that degree. If they wish to transfer to the PhD program, they must apply to the admissions committee, which will make its decision based on the student's performance in the MS program and on faculty recommendations.

Full Graduate Status

A student is admitted to a degree program with full status if he or she has minimally earned a bachelor's degree, has maintained a grade point average of at least B, and has completed the following courses or their equivalents. A student is admitted to a degree program with full graduate status if they have earned at least a BS degree, maintained a grade point average of at least B, and completed minimally a selection of courses in the following topical areas (the corresponding Pitt course numbers are indicated):

1. In Computer Science, one course in each of:
   • Discrete Structures (CS 0441)
   • Information/Data Structures (CS 0445)
   • Computer Organization/Assembly Language (CS 0447)
   • Theory (CS 1510 or 1511)
   • Languages (CS 1520 or 1621)
   • Systems (CS 1550 or 1651)
2. In Mathematics, the following:
   • The three-course calculus sequence (Math 0220, 0230, 0240)
   • A course in linear algebra (Math 1180 or 0280)
   • A course in probability and statistics, requiring calculus as prerequisite (Stat 1151, 1152)

Provisional Graduate Status

A student may be admitted to the MS degree program with provisional status if their qualifications are minimally deficient. Such students will be advanced to full graduate status after removal of the identified deficiences. Students are expected to gain full graduate status by the time they complete 18 credits or, equivalently, one academic year of full-time graduate studies. Students with provisional status are not allowed to hold a teaching assistantship.

Temporary Graduate Status

This status allows a student to take graduate-level courses for one term without enrolling in a graduate program. Temporary status is appropriate for a student who:

• Wants to take one or more specific courses for which they have the necessary qualifications;
• Has deficiencies (in background or low grades);
• Fails to meet the deadline for filing an official application for admission but has met all of the requirements for admission into a degree program with full graduate status.

A student interested in applying for such special (temporary) status must first obtain written permission from the faculty member teaching the course of interest and then follow all of the procedures for admission to a graduate degree program.

Application Options

Apply Online: Applications for graduate study must be completed and submitted entirely online. You will be asked to set up a free account with the ApplyYourself Application Network, which enables you to work on your application over several sessions. Your information is transmitted through a secured server and is kept confidential until you submit your application. Only after you submit your application will it be available for review by the department.

Begin the online application process.

For material that must be sent to the department directly (such as GRE and TOEFL scores) our institution code is: 2927. A department code is no longer required.

Please adress mailed material to:

Keena Walker, Graduate Admissions Secretary
Department of Computer Science
6117 Sennott Square
University of Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh, PA 15260
USA

Deadlines

• January 15: Fall admission. All application materials, including TOEFL and GRE results, must be received in the admissions office by January 15.
• September 15: Spring admission. Spring admissions are limited to applicants who are U.S. citizens, U.S. permanent residents, and international students who are enrolled in other universities in the United States. International applicants applying for spring admission and who are not in the U.S. will be automatically considered for the following fall term.

Application Status and Inquiries

E-mail inquiries about Pitt's graduate programs may be sent to cs-admissions@cs.pitt.edu.

To check the status of your graduate school application, please visit the unique URL you were given for the online application. If you do not remember your unique URL, please go to the Online Application page and enter your e-mail address; the URL will be re-sent to you.

Non-U.S. Citizens

Non-U.S. citizens applying to the graduate program will need the International Graduate Student Supplemental Application Packet:

[ For the 2008-2009 Academic Year (PDF) ]

Previous years: [ 2007-2008 (PDF) ] [ 2006-2007 (PDF) ] [ 2005-2006 (PDF) ]

BS+MS Program

The department also offers a five-year BS+MS program. The BS+MS application is online.