Software Engineering Ph.D. Qualifier Exam
Spring 2023
Exam Committee
Exam Signup for Students
Send an email to gulzar@vt.edu by 12/5 to sign up for the exam. Please include [Qualifier_Spring_2023] in the subject of the email. The content of the email must include: (1) your enrollment year, (2) your research area, and (3) your advisor.
Note that this qualifier exame is exclusively for students invovled in Software Engineering Research. You may withdraw from the exam without penalty (contact Dr. Gulzar) up until when the reading list is due (12/19). From that point, you are committed to being scored unless some extraordinary event intervenes.
Exam Format
The goal of this qualifier is to assess the participating students’ knowledge and comfort in the sub-area of Software engineering in which they aim to pursue their research in. Awarenesss of state-of-the-art research are key elements to incubate and foster impactful reserach ideas.
(1) Written Component. Every student will select a total of 6 papers of their choice. Papers must be highly relavent to their reserach area. One recommended criteria is to pick papers that are mostly likely to form a solid foundation for their future research. Students must submit the list of papers by 12/19.
Students are required to write a 5-pages ACM style sigconf an insightful iterature survey for all six selected papers. References will not be counted towards the page limit. You will organize your paper as follows:
| Section | Length | Instructions |
|---|---|---|
| Abstact | 0.5Column | A brief one paragraph abstract of the survey |
| Introduction | 1 Column | A summary of the motivation behind the work, the problem statement/goal, a very brief description of the selected work, the most imporant takeaway, and how it all ties into your research |
| Paper 1 | 1 Column | Your assessment of each paper. Mainly on (1) the important points and if you agree with those. Either way, explain why? (2) the points not considered or assumptions taken by the authors, (3) what inspired a whole new research project, and (4 ) the next step in this paper?. Your narrative should also demonstrate a clear understanding of the paper |
| . . . | . . . | . . . |
| Paper 6 | 1 Column | |
| Conclusion | 1 Column | What did you learn about the domain, any problems you find that are worth investigating. Pan out some future research questions. How does this help with your research? and You should explain how your proposed research advances the selected work or how it differs. |
The questions will likely require the student to synthesize a subset of the body of work as embodied by these papers into a coherent framework, and/or make some proposal on how to move the research or state of the practice forward. After the written material has been given an inital evaluation by the committee, each student will be given a 15 minutes oral presentation. This examination will focus on the high-level takeaways and future directions learned from the survey.
(2) Oral Component. will comprise of a 15 minutes of oral presentation in-person. 5 minutes of Q/A. One week before the written submission.
Evaluation Criteria
The grading policy is as below:
- 0 points if the oral presentation is confusing and the written component is a mere summary or paraphrasing of papers. The written component needs an end-to-end rewrite.
- 1 point if the literature analysis is sufficient, but the presentation is unsatisfactory (e.g., poor content organization, hard-to-understand explanation, failure to answer questions). The writing needs major overhauling.
- 2 points if both the literature survey and presentation are satisfactory but not in sync with the future plan (e.g., contains unconvincing, inconsistent arguments). The writing quality meets the bar of a SE conference paper that requires minor revision.
- 3 points if both survey and presentation are cohesive, the analysis is substantial and contains depth, and the assessment of the papers is well-thought-out, justified, and backed by solid reasoning. The writing quality meets the bar of top-tier SE conference submission.
After the exam, the committee will discuss the result and give students comments, feedback, and suggestions. Finally, the chair will email students and GPC about the score.
Important Timelines
| Date | Milestone | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Nov 28th, 2022 | Release the Qualifier Instructions and Exam Guidlines | |
| Dec 5th, 2022 | Students must commit to take exam. You have to register with the chair of the exam. | |
| Dec 12th, 2022 | Last day to withdraw | |
| Dec 19th, 2022 | Students select papers and share with the chair | |
| Week of Jan 30th | Oral Component of the qualifier is conducted | |
| Feb 3rd 2023 | Written Component of the qualifier is due by this date | |
| Feb 15th 2023 | Results are shared with the students and the GPC |
Academic Integrity
The answers submitted by every student to the qualifier questions should reflect their individual effort. Therefore, discussions of the writing prompt once it has been posted are prohibited among students. This examination is conducted under the University’s Graduate Honor System Code. Students are encouraged to draw from other papers than those listed in the exam to the extent that this strengthens their arguments. However, the answers submitted must represent the sole and complete work of the student submitting the answers. Material substantially derived from other works, whether published in print or found on the web, must be explicitly and fully cited. Your grade will be more strongly influenced by arguments you make rather than arguments you quote or cite.