Grading System–Doctoral Program
The grading system for doctoral studies includes the letter grades A, B, C, D, and F for all courses. Research and statistics courses with an earned grade of B- or below must be retaken before proceeding forward in the doctoral program. The third grade below a B- in the same attempted course leads to permanent termination from the program.
A grade point average of 3.5 must be maintained for satisfactory academic progress. Grades of F or D will likely result in permanent termination unless an emergency arises or the student files a successful program appeal. Emergency circumstances are: hospitalization of self or immediate family member; death in immediate family; and military deployment. Students are welcome to appeal to the Program Director.
For content courses, incompletes are permitted only in the event of sickness or emergency reasons near end of course. They must be approved by the professor and the program leader. Incompletes are not permitted for simply not completing work. The “I” must be removed by the end of the subsequent semester.
Research-Based Technology, Quantitative Research and Analysis I & II, Qualitative Research and Analysis I & II, Theoretical Framework courses, and all Dissertation Research Seminar courses are gate-keeping benchmarks within the PhD program. For these courses to be completed successfully, students must earn a final grade of B- or higher. Students cannot proceed in the doctoral program until these courses are successfully completed.