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Example Plan of Study

The MS in Telecommunications program does not have a rigid Plan of Study that students must follow. To graduate, students must
- Have completed 15 credit hours of the core element
- Have completed 15 credit hours of specialty module courses, or there equivalent from other programs
- Have earned a minimum of a B grade in all of the core courses with a "TCOM" course designation, which at the present are TCOM 500, 501, 502, and 521.
- Have earned at least a C grade in the elective element of the core courses (LAW 181, PUBP 726, TCOM 514, and TELE 750).
- Have a combined, minimum, total of 30 credit hours with a minimum GPA of 3.0.
- Have no more than a total of 6 credit hours of C grades.

Normally, students will have concentrated on two Specialty Modules, but they have the option of taking up to 6 credit hours of elective courses outside these two modules, depending on the modules they select. See the FAQ questions #33 and #34.

Nearly all students have minor variations or requirements that necessitate 'adjustments'. The example plans of study shown below, together with a typical course progression, are for illustration only. Students are encouraged to formulate their own, individual plan, with an advisor before they have taken more than 9 credit hours in the program.

George Mason University is developing strategic alliances with programs in other universities. For example, students who earn the certificate in Information Systems Management from UVA may transfer in up to 12 credit hours of this certificate as a de facto specialty module of its own, provided the individual courses transferred in were passed with a grade B, or above. The 12 credit hours of UVA ISM courses transfer into modules 4 and 5 of the TCOM program and all that remains to satisfy the MS in Telecommunications degree is to complete the 15 credit hour TCOM core plus an additional 3 credit hours of elective courses in the specialty modules.

Please note that students must earn 18 credit hours while in regular master's status at George Mason University to be awarded an MS in Telecommunications degree by George Mason University, thus students must enter the MS in Telecommunications program in regular master's status to be able to transfer in all 12 credit hours from the ISM certificate. Other universities also offer certificate programs and, depending on the program course content and the university, between 6 and 15 credit hours of these certificate programs may be transferred in to the MS in Telecommunications degree. An example of this is the National Defense University. Graduates of the Information Assurance Certification Program (IACP) (NSTISSI Standard 4011) may transfer in the equivalent of 9 credit hours from this program into the MS in Telecommunications program. Please check with the Program Director if you have earned a certificate from an accredited program at a recognized university and would like to find out how many credit hours will transfer into your MS in Telecommunications degree.

Should a student want to earn a Certificate as part of their master's degree, they should plan carefully to satisfy the Certificate requirement while taking courses to complete their master's degree. In addition, if a student is considering going on for a Ph.D. in Information Technology after completing their MS in Telecommunications, they should look at the courses from which they should select their Ph.D. qualifying exams and see if these courses could be taken as part of their MS in Telecommunications program. Students may not take these 5XX level courses as part of their Ph.D. program for credit, but they can take them for credit if they fit within their master's program. Please visit http://ite.gmu.edu/PhDprogr/main.html if you would like to have more details on the Ph.D. in Information technology.

Many students take advantage of summer course offerings to speed up their program. The mandatory core TCOM courses (TCOM 500, TCOM 501/502, and TCOM 521) are offered every summer. Of the elective core courses, LAW 181 and PUBP 726 are generally offered every summer; TELE 750 (or its equivalent TCOM 750) will be offered in summer 2004; Current plans are to have TCOM 514 offered in summer 2004 or 2005.

In the plans of study given below, just four examples are given. Please note that every student is different and it is important for the student to discuss their individual plan of study before they start their second semester or complete 9 credit hours (including transfer courses).

Student A: This student is interested in Specialty Modules 1 and 2; is entering as a non-degree student; has no courses to be transferred in; works full time and so can manage no more than 6 credit hours per regular semester.

Application for regular degree status filed during the fall semester (by October 1st). Entry as a regular status MS candidate is approved by the start of the spring semester.

Fall 2 PUBP 726 Regular MS 3 credits 18 credits
TCOM 504 Regular MS 1.5 credits 19.5 credits
TCOM 509 Regular MS 1.5 credits 21 credits

At this point, the student has 12 credits satisfied in the core program, 6 credits satisfied in Specialty Module 1, and 3 credits satisfied in Module 2. Note that TCOM 513 also counts in Module 2 so that the student could elect to have 4.5 credits in Module 1 and 4.5 credits in Module 2.

Spring 2 TELE 750 Regular MS 3 credits 24 credits
TCOM 540 Regular MS 1.5 credits 25.5 credits
TCOM 541 Regular MS 1.5 credits 27 credits

At this point, the student has 15 credits satisfied in the core program, which completes that requirement, and 12 credits satisfied in the Specialty Modules 1 and 2. TCOM 504/509, TCOM 503/513, and TCOM 510 yield a total of 7.5 credits in Module 1 with TCOM 505 and TCOM 540/541 counting in module 2 for a total of 4.5 credit hours. Alternatively, the student may count TCOM 513, and TCOM 510 in Module 2 giving 7.5 credits in Module 2 and 4.5 credits in Module 1. There is a lot of flexibility in how the courses may be allocated.

The student now has a total of 27 credit hours in the MS in TCOM program and needs 3 credit hours to graduate. The student elects to take an Independent Study course over the summer for 3 credit hours.

Summer 2 TCOM 598 Regular MS 3 credits 30 credits

The student now has enough credits to graduate.

Student B: This student is interested in Specialty Modules 1 and 3; is entering as a non-degree student; wants to transfer in a graduate courses in optical fiber communications (3 credits) and satellite communications (3 credits) earned at another ABET-accredited university; works full time and so can manage no more than 6 credit hours per regular semester.
The graduate optical fiber communications course is transferred into module 1 and the graduate satellite communications course is transferred into module 3. The student therefore enters the program with 6 credit hours.

Semester Courses Status Credits earned Total Credits
Fall 1 TCOM 500 Non-Degree 3 credits 9 credits
TCOM 501 Non-Degree 1.5 credits 10.5 credits
TCOM 502 Non-Degree 1.5 credits 12 credits

Application for regular degree status filed during the fall semester. The student's entry as a regular status MS candidate is approved by the end of the fall semester.

Spring 1 TCOM 521 Regular MS 3 credits 15 credits
TCOM 506 Regular MS 1.5 credits 16.5 credits
TCOM 516 Regular MS 1.5 credits 18 credits

At this point, the student has satisfied 9 credits in the core element and 9 credits in the Specialty Modules. Of the latter 9 credits, the split is 6 credits in Module 3 and 3 credits in Module 1. The student takes LAW 181 as a summer course.

Summer 1 LAW 181 Regular MS 3 credits 21 credits

Fall 2 TELE 750 Regular MS 3 credits 24 credits
TCOM 551 Regular MS 3 credits 27 credits

At this point, the student has satisfied the required 15 credit hours in the core element and has 12 credit hours in the Specialty Modules. Of the latter 12 credits, the split is 6 credits in Module 3 and 6 credits in Module 1. Alternatively (depending on whether TCOM 551 is counted in module 1 or 3), the split could be 6/6, 9/3 or 7.5/4.5 in Modules 1 and 3, respectively. The last split shows that when a course is considered to be in more than one module, it may be counted half in one module and half in another. If the student elects the last split, by "carrying forward" TCOM 501/502 into module 3, the student may chose to have satisfied module 3 (4.5 + 3 from TCOM 501/502 = 7.5 credits) and so may take those 3 credits as an elective in another module. For example, the student may take TCOM 505/510 from module 2. We will assume that this is the case, yielding:

Spring 2 TCOM 505 Regular MS 1.5 credits 28.5 credits
TCOM 510 Regular MS 1.5 credits 30 credits

The student now has sufficient credit hours to graduate. This gives a total elapsed time of 22 months (August year 1 to May year 2) for this student who entered the program with 6 credit hours from another university.

Student C: This is a non-resident student (F-1 visa) interested in modules 3 and 4, with no courses being transferred in.

Non-resident nationals can only attend as full-time students and so have to go through the regular admissions process. Normally, all of the documents for the applications process should be filed with the Graduate Admissions Office in IT&E by April 1st (for fall entry that year) or October 1st (for spring entry the following year). To maintain their F-1 visa status, such students need to be full-time students in good standing. This means that they have to take 9 credits per semester and maintain a B average. Taking 9 credit hours in the first semester is sometimes difficult as TCOM 500 is a prerequisite for many of the elective courses. A few specialty module courses exist that require only graduate standing (i.e. do not require TCOM 500). Two examples of these are TCOM 547 Project Management and TCOM 548/556 that cover information Security Issues and Cryptography. In this particular case, Student C has a relatively good background in mathematical concepts such a sine functions, logarithms, and decibel notations, and so could take TCOM 551 without first taking TCOM 500. The student is assumed to be admitted in the fall.

Semester Courses Status Credits earned Total Credits
Fall 1 TCOM 500 Regular MS 3 credits 3 credits
TCOM 501 Regular MS 1.5 credits 4.5 credits
TCOM 502 Regular MS 1.5 credits 6 credits
TCOM 551 Regular MS 3 credits 9 credits

Spring 1 TCOM 507 Regular MS 1.5 credits 10.5 credits
TCOM 508 Regular MS 1.5 credits 12 credits
TCOM 540 Regular MS 1.5 credits 13.5 credits
TCOM 541 Regular MS 1.5 credits 15 credits
PUBP 726 Regular MS 3 credits 18 credits

At this point, the student has satisfied 9 credits in the core element and 9 credits in the Specialty Modules. Of the 9 credits in the Specialty Modules, 3 are in module 4 and 6 credits are in module 3 (counting TCOM 551 as module 3 rather than module1, since it can be listed in either). Note, however, that this student is able to "carry forward" 6 credits into the specialty modules (since TCOM 501/502 may count in module 3 and TCOM 521 in module 4). Thus, while only 6 credits have been earned in module 3 and only 3 credits in module 4, for the purposes of satisfying these modules, 9 credits may be assumed in module 3 (by carrying forward TCOM 501/502) and 6 credits in module 4 (by carrying forward TCOM 521, when it is taken). Both modules may be taken as having been satisfied. Thus the remainder of the Specialty Module courses may be taken as electives in any module. We will assume that this student wants to concentrate in the area of wireless communications. The 3 elective credits (for a 30 credit hour program) will therefore be in a wireless course.

The student elects to take an Independent Study course over the summer in module 4, thus:

Summer 1 TCOM 599 Regular MS 3 credits 21 credits

The student decides to take TELE 750 rather than LAW 181 and, with TCOM 521, completes the core course requirement. The third course chosen in this scenario is mobile communications, as follows:

Fall 2 TCOM 521 Regular MS 3 credits 24 credits
TELE 750 Regular MS 3 credits 27 credits
TCOM 552 Regular MS 3 credits 30 credits

The student has now satisfied the requirements of a 30 credit hour program and graduates with an MS in Telecommunications in the fall of the second year, with an elapsed time of 16 months (August year 1 to December year 2).

Student D: This student has a good undergraduate background in software and systems engineering but wants to broaden the telecommunications background; the student is interested in taking the module 5/ 15-credit hours option; wants to start as soon as possible but missed the spring sign up; coming in therefore as non-degree in the summer; elects to take TCOM 500 in the summer program; works full time and so can manage no more than 6 credit hours per regular semester.

Semester Courses Status Credits earned Total Credits
Summer 1 TCOM 500 non-degree 3 credits 3 credits

Fall 1 TCOM 501 non-degree 1.5 credits 4.5 credits
TCOM 502 non-degree 1.5 credits 6.0 credits
TCOM 521 non-degree 3.0 credits 9.0 credits

The student now has 9 credits in the program, all in the core element. The student applied for regular master's entry during the fall semester and this was granted. The student enters the spring semester in regular MS status.

Spring 1 SYST 510 Regular MS 3 credits 12 credits
PUBP 726 Regular MS 3 credits 15 credits

Summer 2 LAW 181 Regular MS 3 credits 18 credits

Fall 2 TCOM 546 Regular MS 3 credits 21 credits
SYST 513 Regular MS 3 credits 24 credits

Spring 2 TCOM 699 Regular MS 3 credits 27 credits
ITRN 772 Regular MS 3 credits 30 credits

The student now has 30 credit hours and may graduate from the 30 credit hour program. In this case, the student decided not to carry forward TCOM 521 from the core element into module 5 and so did not choose to take an elective course either in module 5 or anywhere else.