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Students in the BS in Information Technology Program may elect to enter the Accelerated MS in Telecommunications (MS in TCOM) Program while they are undergraduate students. The accelerated program is designed for qualified undergraduate students in the information technology program who would like to proceed directly into the MS in TCOM Program, completing the two degrees with 144 credits. Students must satisfy requirements for the undergraduate degree (120 credits) and the MS degree (30 credits), with 6 credits of overlap permitted. The MS in TCOM is on an accelerated track, with 6 credits taken as an undergraduate and 24 credits as a graduate student. The 6 undergraduate credits must be selected from those given in the listing that follows and will be substituted for BS degree concentration electives, subject to prior approval by an advisor. Note: Students in the accelerated program must take ECE 301 as one of their BS in information technology concentration electives.

Applicants must be Mason undergraduate students in the BS in Information Technology Program. Students may apply for the accelerated program during the semester after which they will have completed 90 or more credits applicable toward the BS degree. Students must have an overall GPA of at least 3.25 to apply for the program. Students who have not yet finished 90 credits may be accepted provisionally subject to satisfactory completion of 90 credits. Criteria for admission into the accelerated program are identical to criteria for admission into the MS in TCOM Program, except that students do not need to have completed an undergraduate degree prior to admission.

Accepted students must maintain a minimum 3.25 GPA in the undergraduate segment of the accelerated program and a 3.00 GPA in the graduate segment. That is, after students have been accepted into the accelerated program, they must maintain a 3.25 GPA until they have satisfied requirements for the undergraduate degree. They must then maintain a minimum 3.00 GPA in the graduate segment of the accelerated program. Should their GPA fall below 3.00 while a graduate student, they will be dropped from the accelerated program to the regular program, and those graduate TCOM courses taken and applied to the BS in information technology will no longer be admissible for the MS in TCOM. If students are dropped from the accelerated program and have taken and applied TCOM core courses toward the BS degree, then they need not repeat those courses for the regular MS in TCOM Program if they obtained a grade of B or higher in those courses. But they will need to take elective courses in their place to satisfy the 30-credit requirement for the regular MS in TCOM.

Similarly, if students are dropped from the accelerated program and have taken and applied noncore TCOM courses toward the BS degree, then they do not need to repeat those courses for the regular MS in TCOM Program if they obtained a grade of C or higher for those courses. Elective courses will be required to replace TCOM courses already taken and dropped from the program. Note: Up to two C grades may be carried in the regular TCOM program in nonmandatory core courses. A minimum GPA of 3.00 is required to graduate with an MS in TCOM.

Students must complete all requirements for the BS degree. Students in the accelerated program must apply to have the BS degree conferred the semester before they expect to complete the BS requirements. The MS in TCOM is granted on completion of all requirements for the accelerated degree.

TCOM courses that may be taken as an undergraduate student as part of the Accelerated BS in Information Technology/MS in TCOM Program are noted in the listing below. Note: All of the prerequisite courses indicated below must be passed with a grade of B or higher.

Telecommunications courses:

• TCOM 500 Modern Telecommunications
• TCOM 501 Data Communications and LANs (prerequisite: acceptance into the Accelerated BSIT/ MS TCOM Program)
• TCOM 502 Wide Area Networks and Internet (prerequisites: TCOM 501, IT 341, or equivalent)
• TCOM 503 Fiber Optic Communications (prerequisite: TCOM 500 or equivalent)
• TCOM 504 Asynchronous Transfer Mode Network (prerequisites: TCOM 501 and 502, IT 341, or equivalent)
• TCOM 505 Networked Multicomputer Systems (prerequisite: TCOM 501, IT 341, or equivalent)
• TCOM 509 Internet Protocols (prerequisites: TCOM 501 and 502, IT 341, or equivalent)
• TCOM 510 Client Server Architectures and Applications (prerequisite: TCOM 505)
• TCOM 513 Optical Communications Networks (prerequisite: TCOM 503)
• TCOM 519 Voice Over IP (prerequisites: TCOM 509, IT 341, or equivalent)
• TCOM 529 Advanced Internet Protocols (prerequisite: TCOM 509)
• TCOM 539 Advanced Voice Over IP (prerequisite: TCOM 519)
• TCOM 551 Digital Communication Systems (prerequisite: TCOM 500 or equivalent)
• TCOM 607 Satellite Communications (prerequisite: TCOM 551, ECE 463, or equivalent)

Note: Students in the accelerated program who have passed IT 341 with a grade of B or higher will not be required to take TCOM 501 in the MS in TCOM core and may take an elective 1.5-credit course instead.