School of Engineering

Admission and Transfer Policies

Freshman Applicants

To be admitted to the School of Engineering, a student must be admitted to the University of Mississippi and meet certain academic requirements. To be admitted into the Chemical Engineering, Civil Engineering, Computer and Information Science, Electrical Engineering, Geological Engineering, Geology, or Mechanical Engineering degree program as a freshman, a student must have earned a 25 or higher on the Math portion of the ACT (or SAT equivalent or a C or higher on the Cambridge O-Level Examination) AND have a core high school GPA of 3.0 or higher. To be admitted into the General Engineering degree program as a freshman, a student must have earned a 20 or higher on the Math portion of the ACT (or SAT equivalent or a C or higher on the Cambridge O-Level Examination) AND have a core high school GPA of 2.8 or higher. Students with a score below 25 on the Math portion of the ACT must enroll in MATH 125 (or MATH 121 and 123) and earn a grade of B or higher. Students with less than a 3.0 core high school GPA must enroll in EDHE 105 Freshman Year Experience course.

Transfer Applicants

For a university student to declare a change of major and for a transfer student from another institution to enter into any of the Engineering degree programs, a student must have earned a B or higher in MATH 125 (or MATH 121 and 123), or a higher mathematics course, and have a cumulative undergraduate GPA of 2.25 or higher.

General

Any student who is admitted to the university and does not meet these standards upon admission can choose from the other degree programs for which they qualify at the university.

Academic Regulations

General Eduation Core Curriculum

The general education requirements of the undergraduate degree programs of the School of Engineering are consistent with The University of Mississippi's tradition of educating engineering leaders through the school's strong interaction with the university's liberal arts programs. Further, these requirements are established to fulfill the school's published mission of preparing "students with a broad-based education" intended to develop "leadership skills" and "communication skills." The core/general education requirements for the School of Engineering include Writ 101, Writ 102; Math 261-262; and a minimum of 8 credit hours of laboratory science courses as specified by each department.

In addition, 18 credit hours as described below must be taken, but students should check with their department to learn the specific course requirements for an individual program.

Fifteen Credits of Liberal Arts – Students must complete at least 15 semester hours consisting of social/behavioral sciences, humanities, and fine arts course work. At least 6 credit hours must be in the social/behavioral sciences, and at least 9 credit hours must be in combined humanities and fine arts courses with at least 3 semester hours from each of these areas. For the purpose of these requirements, social/behavioral sciences will include anthropology, economics, political science, psychology, and sociology; humanities will include classics, literature, history, modern languages, philosophy, religion, African American Studies, Gender Studies, and Southern Studies; and fine arts will include courses in the history, appreciation, and criticism of art, dance, music, and theatre arts. (Courses emphasizing the enhancement of skills and performance are not acceptable.) Honors courses may be used to meet these requirements as appropriate. Three credits of additional general education course work: Students must complete an additional 3 semester hours of course work beyond the 15 hours required above. These additional 3 hours are to be composed of any additional fine arts, humanities, or social science course work (as defined above) or any combination of credits from the courses listed below:

Cooperative Education Program – A student desiring to participate in the School of Engineering Cooperative Education Program must obtain the approval by his or her department chair. Co-op work terms are defined as Fall, Spring, and Full Summer. Students desiring to earn co-op credit (C OP 201, C OP 202, C OP 301, C OP 302, C OP 401, or C OP 402) must have an internship opportunity that has been approved by their chair to work for 40 hours per week. Enrollment status during a co-op work term is equivalent to a full time academic load at the University of Mississippi. Based on the internship project, and the internship work load level, the number of credits ( 1 to 3), and the grade (Z or regular), the engineering Dean’s office will enroll the co-op students, appropriately. The enrolled co-op student is considered full-time regardless of the number of credits earned for the co-op work.

School of Engineering Overall Degree Requirements

Basic Degree Requirements – All of the curricula of the School of Engineering leading to a Bachelor of Science or Bachelor of Engineering degree are four-year curricula. The curricula requirements for the degrees of Bachelor of Science in Chemical Engineering, Bachelor of Science in Civil Engineering, Bachelor of Science in Computer Science, Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering, Bachelor of Science in Geological Engineering, Bachelor of Science in Geology, Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering, and Bachelor of Engineering are listed in their respective sections of the catalog.

Technical Electives – In some programs, students are allowed to choose a coherent group of courses from appropriate areas to permit the student to pursue particular topics in more depth than provided by required courses or to complement the student's major area of study. Selection of these courses should be made in consultation with and approved by the student's department chair/adviser.

Minors – Students pursuing any of the eight degree programs within the School of Engineering may choose to declare a minor. A minor field may be any discipline that offers a minor at The University of Mississippi with the exception of chemistry for chemical engineering students, geology for geological engineering students, and computer science for electrical engineering students pursuing the computer engineering option. The required courses and number of hours for each minor field can be found in the university undergraduate catalog. However, no more than 7 credit hours from courses required by the engineering degree and cited specifically by course number and title as a requirement for that degree may be used toward fulfillment of the minor requirements. A minor is available for students pursuing the Bachelor of Engineering degree if different from the emphasis area.

Advising

Each entering freshman and transfer student is assigned to a member of the School of Engineering faculty in their department who acts as the student’s adviser. Students are required to schedule regular conferences with their adviser. In addition, students are encouraged to confer with their advisers or other faculty members as the need arises at times other than the regularly scheduled conferences. A record of advising meetings and degree progress is maintained by the department in which the student is majoring. The purpose for the faculty advising is to ensure that students are completing the appropriate required courses in the proper prerequisite order to meet graduation requirements that have been previously specified to meet ABET, the Institutions of Higher Learning (IHL), university, and other criteria.

Honor Code Policy

Honor System - The purpose of the School of Engineering honor system is to inculcate in each student the highest standard of personal integrity and professional responsibility. The honor pledge below stresses student honesty both in and out of the classroom. For dealing with infractions, the School of Engineering adopted the University policy "Student Academic Conduct and Discipline". "I PLEDGE MYSELF TO UPHOLD THE HIGHEST STANDARDS OF HONESTY IN MY UNIVERSITY LIFE AND I WILL NOT TOLERATE DISHONESTY ON THE PART OF OTHERS."

Application for Degree

During the semester prior to completing degree requirements for a particular degree, each student is required to make formal application for that degree. The process includes the student completing the Degree Application found on the School of Engineering website under Current Students. This application must be submitted to the student's department for review. With departmental approval, the Engineering Dean's Office will then authorize the student's Diploma Application in MyOleMiss. When the student completes the Diploma Application, the student is considered an official candidate for graduation for the specified term. The Dean's office will verify whether all degree requirements have been fulfilled using the Degree Audit system. In addition to University GPA requirements, all undergraduate degree programs in the School of Engineering require that students earn a GPA of at least 2.00 in all courses taken from the School of Engineering applicable to their degree. The Dean's office then certifies degrees that have been fulfilled in a Degree Confirmation report to the Office of the Registrar for the granting of the diploma.