Graduate Student Petitions

The student should complete the Graduate Student Petition in consultation with the adviser to request any exceptions to Graduate College rules, regulations, and requirements. Common petition requests include transferring credit, changing departments, adding or dropping courses, registering for an overload, registering in absentia, continuing from a master’s degree to a doctorate degree, and time extensions.

Petitions require a minimum of two signatures (adviser and department chair/head) but may require additional signatures. A petition approved at one level may be denied at another level. Upon receipt of the department chair/head’s signature, the department will forward it to the Graduate College for final approval.

Exceptions to College of Education rules may be petitioned by the same process. However, the department will forward the petition to the Student Academic Affairs Office for final approval by the Associate Dean for Academic Programs. The petition will not go forward to the Graduate College.

Applying Certificate of Advanced Study Credits in Doctoral Programs

A student who has completed course work taken as a part of the requirements for the Certificate of Advanced Study in Education at the University of Illinois may petition for not more than 24 hours of such work and dissertation hours combined toward the program leading to the Ed.D., provided that the course work was taken within five years of the date of the petition. Credit earned in the Certificate of Advanced Study degree may not be applied toward a Ph.D. degree. If an individual is pursuing a Certificate of Advanced Study and decides to seek a Ph.D. instead, the usual Graduate Student Petition procedures should be followed without receiving the Certificate of Advanced Study degree. If this change is effected and the Certificate of Advanced Study degree is not awarded, previous course work intended to apply to the Certificate of Advanced Study can be counted toward the Ph.D. degree, subject to other policies governing the Ph.D. program.

When considering a Certificate of Advanced Study program or a change of status from Certificate of Advanced Study to a doctoral degree program one issue to consider is that doctoral degree time limit begins with the first course used to meet doctoral requirements, even if this course was originally taken as part of a Certificate of Advanced Study program.

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