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Qualifying Exams

Information about Quals:

Artificial Intelligence

A one-hour long session in which three faculty ask the student general questions related to the list of papers he/she has proposed (and obtained approval). There is no research presentation. At the end of the exam, the three faculty will have a brief closed-door discussion and make the decision.

Qualifying Examination in Artificial Intelligence

The purpose of the AI Qualification Exam is to ensure that the successful candidate has in-depth knowledge of one or more substantial subareas of AI (usually the area or areas in which the student intends to do his or her doctoral research). Subareas include things like vision, robotics, probabilistic reasoning, computational logic, machine learning, multi-agent systems, and natural language processing (though there is no requirement that the subarea be one of these possibilities). (The breadth expected is one or more such "top-level" divisions of AI - or a range of work equivalent in scope. It can't be "Markov Decision Processes for Robot Control".)

To pass this exam, the candidate must first assemble a qualification exam committee of thre AI experts, of which at least two are active members of the Stanford Academic Council and affiliated with SAIL. The committee should be chaired by the student's research advisor.

Together with this committee, the candidate should agree upon the research or areas of AI that will be the focus of the exam. The candidate should then prepare a reading list of material in the selected areas, and the candidate should write a one-page explanation of the rationale behind this list, giving the area or areas covered. This explanation, along with the reading list, should be circulated to the committee and to the chair of the AI Qualifying Exam Committee for approval. The Chair of the AI Qualification Exam and the student's individual committee will then either approve the list or suggest further improvements to the candidate.

The AI Qualification Exam itself is an oral exam administered in one sitting. The committee may request the student to first present the content of the papers in the reading list (or a subset thereof, which are chosen as the focus) to the committee. Follwoing the presentation (if any), the committee should quiz the student about the topics covered by the reading list. A successful candidate must exhibit in-depth knowledge in the scientific areas covered by the reading list and must respond insightfully to the questions asked by the committee.

In evaluating the student's performance, the committee will consider three potential outcomes of the exam: Pass, Conditional Pass, and Fail. In the case of a conditional pass, the committee might place certain requirements on the student, such as taking or TAing classes. A failing candidate can retake this exam but has to begin the process from the very beginning. You may take the qual at most twice during your program. If you fail twice, you are out. Normal progress guidelines say you should pass in your second year. However, if a student takes the qual in the second year and fails, we have generally allowed the student to try again in year 3. But that is it.

Physiqual

The Physiqual will now consist of exams with faculty in 5 areas: vision, geometry, math, graphics and robotics.

The second part of the Physiqual which consists of a talk on a few selected papers will no longer be part of the Physiqual, given that we now have a Thesis Proposal.

For students who have ALREADY taken the second oral portion of the Physiqual, I would suggest their advisors grandfather them through the Thesis Proposal requirement.

The current language of the Thesis Proposal requirement would seem to allow this.

Theory Qualifying Exam Overview

Form a panel of three professors, select 3-4 papers in an area related (but usually not identical) to your thesis work for you to read, review and synthesize over a period of a month (30 days). Write a report on your review/synthesis, give it to the committee, and also make an oral presentation to the committee, followed by questions.