8.5 Adding Ph.D. Programs

(Approved May 17, 1995)

Any academic unit at the Naval Postgraduate School wishing to offer a Ph.D. program must meet the following criteria:

1. The academic unit must have an active master's degree program in the field of the proposed Ph.D. program.
2. There must be adequate physical facilities, such as laboratories, and equipment, for research in the field of study. There must also be adequate library facilities accessible to support research in the field.
3. The faculty of the academic unit must be diverse enough to give such a program.
4. A reasonable number of the faculty must hold the doctorate and be currently active in research as evidenced by publications in the open literature.
5. The academic unit must have two or more qualified faculty members in each subfield where it is proposed to award the doctorate.
6. The academic unit must contain faculty members who have had experience, at NPS or elsewhere, in serving on doctoral committees or otherwise been involved in supervising doctoral programs.

An academic unit wishing to offer a Ph.D. program must submit a document to the Academic Council giving evidence that the above criteria have been met. Furthermore, the academic unit must specify exactly those subfields in the general discipline in which it plans to award the degree, and it supply a list of academic unit faculty members who are qualified to serve on dissertation committees for each subfield.

If an academic unit wishes to add a new subfield to an existing Ph.D. program, the academic unit will apply to the Academic Council and supply evidence that it has sufficient depth in the subfield. Such evidence must include a list of faculty members in the subfield and a list of courses it anticipates offering in the subfield.

If the Academic Council determines that an academic unit no longer meets the criteria for a Ph.D. program, the Academic Council has the right to rescind an academic unit's privilege of offering a Ph.D. program.

Two or more academic units who wish to offer a joint doctoral program must follow the procedures outlined above.