First Year

1. Matriculant and First Year Advisors:
In addition to being responsible for administrative concerns, the Director of Graduate Studies advises the matriculating student and oversees registration for the first semester of course work.

2. Advisor:
The student should select an advisor by the beginning of the second semester.

3. Service:
It is a requirement of the graduate program that all students, irrespective of funding source (e.g., FLAS, NSF, APSI, Ford, J.B. Duke, Duke Endowment, etc.), provide research or teaching service to the department in years 1, 2, 3, 5 and 6. Normally, this would include research assistance to faculty in year 1 and teaching assistance in years 2, 3 and 5. Students often teach their own classes in year 6. However, all assignments will be determined by departmental needs and student needs/qualifications. Students may receive course credit for one of their TA assignments in the second or third year. This would normally occur in a course that has a heavy teaching load (i.e., where TAs conduct discussion sections, help design exams, etc.). No service will be required in the 4th year while a student is out of residence conducting dissertation research. However, a student will not be eligible for a service-free stipend until the Preliminary exam is successfully completed. For details of the department's Teaching Assistant and Research Assistant philosophy and policy, see TA-RA Policy

4. Plan of Study:
The Plan of Study is intended to make students think about the courses they need to take in order to acquire competence as professional anthropologists, to define their long-range research projects, and to ensure students are meeting university and departmental requirements in a timely manner. It also provides faculty an opportunity to give students feedback regarding appropriate course work and other achievements essential to attaining their academic goals.

Students are responsible for proposing a Plan of Study that describes future curriculum and other academic accomplishments necessary to meet research and professional objectives. The Plan of Study should be designed in consultation with the student's advisor(s) and is due at the end of February each year. The full text should be no longer than two pages, single spaced. The Plan of Study should contain:

* One or more concise paragraphs describing the student's ethnographic and two theoretical areas of interest, including a list of the three areas that the student anticipates will form the basis of the Qualifying Exam;

* A list of courses the student has taken in the graduate program thus far, how the language requirement will be met, and a list of RA/TA assignments to date;

* A list of the remaining courses the student plans to take to complete his/her 6 semesters. The proposal cannot possibly specify all courses to be taken over the next three or more semesters, since some of these courses are not scheduled in advance; but it should specify the general topics and rough order of course work;

* A description of any non-course experiences, such as fieldwork or field language study, that can reasonably be completed during the student's graduate career, and that will contribute importantly to the student's program. (See Required Courses) In order to facilitate the broadest possible feedback and to ensure that students' intellectual interests are known to the entire faculty, the department as a whole will review all Plans of Study.

5. Student Evaluation at the End of First Year:
During the spring semester of the first year, students will be evaluated by the regular graduate faculty in Cultural Anthropology, meeting as a whole and using the Plan of Study written by each student as a basis of discussion. At that time a student may be 1) continued in the program unconditionally; 2) continued in the program on a conditional basis, if the faculty decides that the student needs to develop certain background areas or particular academic skills; or 3) dropped from the program, if the faculty judge the student's overall performance unacceptable. Directly following the evaluation meeting, the student will be advised by her/his advisor of the decision of the faculty. Any specific recommendations and any conditions to be fulfilled will also be communicated by the student's advisor (with a copy of recommendations to be filed in student's file).

Next: Second Year

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