Comprehensive Examination
- The responsibility for initiating the comprehensive examination
process lies with the doctoral students. Students must communicate
to the chair/co-chairs of their committee when they are ready to sit
for the exam at least two (2) months before their intended date. Students
must be in their last semester of coursework and have the consent of
their chair/co-chairs to be eligible to sit for the comprehensive exam.
It is highly recommended that students be enrolled in no more than
six (6) semester hours while preparing for the exam. For examples of
comprehensive exam questions, please notify a Coordinator for Doctoral
Studies.
- Doctoral comprehensive exams will be held Fall and Spring semesters.
A Coordinator for Doctoral Studies will approve the dates for each
semester.
- Doctoral students have the option of writing part of their comprehensive
examinations off campus. In consultation with their program chair and
committee, students will decide which question(s) will be written on
campus and off campus. Bear in mind that all questions may be written
on campus.
- On campus comprehensive examination questions will be conducted
over the span of not more than 5 working days. Students will write
on one (1) question each day and have up to four (4) hours per day
in which to write the exam. Students will be allowed to use a word
processor and be permitted to bring a 1-page listing of the major citations
which may be used in their responses.
- Off campus comprehensive examination questions will be negotiated
thorough an agreement with the program chair and committee on the exact
nature of the questions and/or the length of time needed to complete
it. Specifically, this negotiation might entail whether the resulting
product might be considered publishable, the length of time allowed
for each question, etc. Thus, this negotiation allows the doctoral
committee to adjust their expectations for the student through the
product that will be provided.
- While the examination questions will be unique for each student,
C&I doctoral students will usually write one (1) question related
to the emphasis area, one (1) question related to the cognate, and
one (1) question related to educational research. Responses to examination
questions will be evaluated based on the: presentation of ideas, organization
of ideas, the quality of the writing, and the extent to which questions
have been answered.
- All committee members will read within 10 working days the three
(3) completed exam questions and evaluate them as "high pass", "pass",
or "fail". Within two (2) weeks of the written exam, doctoral
students will meet with their committee for an interview/oral response
to the examination. The committee will make its final decision and
communicate it to the student immediately following the oral. The committee's
decision must be unanimous. "If the vote is not unanimous, the
student may request the department to administer a second examination. The
student must wait at least three (3) months before taking the second
examination" (UNLV Graduate Catalog). Additional course work or
readings may be suggested by the committee. The comprehensive exam
must be completed successfully before students advance to doctoral
candidacy and register for additional dissertation hours.
Examination Questions
The comprehensive examination is given to provide doctoral students
with the opportunity to demonstrate their level of knowledge in a selected
field of study and to synthesize that knowledge into a professionally
written paper. The committee chair (and co-chairs) will meet with the
doctoral student and collectively identify the major areas from which
possible exam questions will be drawn. The student may submit a pool
of possible questions to the chair. The chair, with the approval of the
committee, will formulate the questions. The entire doctoral committee
will approve the three (3) actual comprehensive exam questions. The three
(3) questions will be submitted to a Coordinator for Doctoral Studies
one (1) month prior to the actual exam date for processing purposes.
