Performance/Reviews

Good Academic Standing/Satisfactory Academic Progress:

To remain in good academic standing in the Ph.D. program, a student must make timely progress toward degree completion and maintain satisfactory academic progress in the program. This includes standards of scholarship established below as well as Sullivan University policies established in other university publications:

• Take courses for letter grades and maintain a minimum grade of C or better in each course and have a cumulative GPA of at least 3.00 after 12 quarter credit hours.
• Maintain a GPA of at least a 2.75 each academic quarter in the program.
• Advance to doctoral candidacy within four years of enrollment in the doctoral program.
• Graduate within two years of advancing to doctoral candidacy.
• Form a doctoral committee, present a dissertation proposal acceptable to faculty members on the committee, pass written and oral comprehensive examinations, write a Ph.D. Policies & Procedures Page 9 Ph.D. dissertation acceptable to all committee members, and pass a final defense of the dissertation.

If a student fails to achieve the required GPA after twelve (12) quarter credit hours, the student may be placed on academic probation. After one quarter of academic probation, if the student still has not reached a 3.0 cumulative GPA, the student may be suspended or dismissed from the program.

Ph.D. students and candidates may be placed on academic probation and ultimately dismissed from the Ph.D. program if they fail to make substantial progress toward their degrees. Probation is intended to provide a student whose performance is less than satisfactory with a period in which to correct the deficiencies or raise his or her performance to a level expected by the Graduate School.

Suspension or dismissal may be warranted based on an evaluation of a student’s progress. There are generally two reasons why a Ph.D. student or candidate would face suspension or dismissal: disciplinary reasons due to academic ethics considerations and for academic deficiencies. The Dean of the Graduate School has authority to place a student on probation, to remove a student from probation, and, if necessary, remove a student from the doctoral program. A student who has been suspended or dismissed from Sullivan University and who wishes to re-enter must submit a request in writing to the Dean of the Graduate School.

First-Quarter and First-Year Reviews

Students have formal and informal reviews of academic progress throughout the Ph.D. program. A first-quarter review is conducted with students who fail to meet minimum expectations required of doctoral students. Doctoral students who perform poorly during their first quarter courses are advised and counseled by the Dean of the Graduate School or by a member of the Ph.D. committee.

The first-year review is intended to be a formal evaluation of a student’s progress during his or her first academic year in the Ph.D. program. Each student will meet with the review panel or committee to appraise his or her status in the Ph.D. program, research agenda, and coursework performance (See Appendix I for First-Year Evaluation Rubric). Upon completion of the review, the panel or committee will make a formal recommendation to the Dean of the Graduate School about the status of the student. The committee may make one of three recommendations: (1) retain the student unconditionally; (2) retain the student but review and monitor; or (3) do not retain the student in the Ph.D. program. All decisions rendered by the committee and approved by the Dean of the Graduate School are considered final.