In this webinar, we welcome Michigan Tech University faculty and Enrollment Advisor to provide an overview of the online Master's in Applied Statistics and online Certificate in Applied Statistics programs including the program structure, learning outcomes, potential career paths, and the online experience.

Panelists:

• Dr. Jiguang Sun, Professor & Interim Chair, Dept. of Mathematical Sciences
• Dr. Melissa Keranen, Professor, Mathematical Sciences; Graduate Director
• Dr. Qiuying Sha, Professor, Mathematical Sciences
• Vinay Patel, Enrollment Advisor

Recorded February 24, 2021.

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Full Transcript:

Christina Walsh

Hello everyone, and welcome. Thank you for joining us for today's info session about the online applied statistics graduate programs at Michigan Technological University. Before we get started today, I'd like to cover a few housekeeping items.

In the dashboard in front of you, feel free to maximize the slides window as you need to. To the right of the screen, we've included a few resource links to keep handy, our brochures, a link to schedule an appointment with the admissions team and also a direct link to the application site. Please feel free type any questions into the Q& A box at the bottom of your screen at any point throughout the presentation. We've reserved some time at the end to answer your questions.

And here are our speakers for today's webinar. First, I'm Christina Walsh and I'll be your moderator today. I'm joined by Vinay Patel, an enrollment advisor for the program, whom I'm sure many of you have already spoken with. Vinay can help answer questions about the online programs, the admissions process and also assist you in getting all your application materials submitted to the selection committee.

We're also joined by Dr. Jiguang Sun, Dr. Melissa Keranen and Dr. Qiuying Sha. Dr. Sun is a professor in the department of mathematical sciences and currently serving as the interim- chair at Michigan Tech. He received his Master of Science in Computer Science and Ph. D. in Applied Mathematics from the University of Delaware. His research areas include eigenvalue problems, numerical methods for partial differential equations, deterministic and statistical methods for inverse problems, Bayesian inversion, and electromagnetic method in geophysics. He has been an associate editor for the journals Applicable Analysis since 2016 and Results in Applied Mathematics since 2018. He has also been on the International Advisory Panel for Inverse Problems since 2019.

Dr. Keranen is a professor in the department of mathematical sciences. She received her bachelor's, master's and Ph. D. from Michigan Tech and has been a faculty member at Michigan Tech since 2005. She works in the area of discrete math and more specifically, her research interests are in graph decompositions and, sorry, combinatorial design. She took over as graduate programs director in July of 2020.

And last but not least, Dr. Sha is a Portage Health endowed professor of population health in the math department. She's a statistician. Her primary research interest is statistical genetics. She developed statistical methods and computational tools to find genes associated with complex diseases. She also collaborates with a group of researchers at Michigan Tech and local hospitals on data analysis. She has been teaching at Michigan Tech for over 15 years.

Now, here's a quick look at our agenda for today. We'll talk about Michigan Technological University and the online applied statistics programs, including the program structure and curriculum. We'll also talk about the demand for statisticians and career opportunities for graduates. We'll then dive into the admissions process and finally leave time for any questions you might have.

Now, I'm going to turn over to Vinay to tell us a little bit about Michigan Tech.

Vinay Patel

Just a little bit about our university here before we dig deeper into the topics and things like that.

Michigan Tech is a public research university. We were founded in 1885. We are a brick- and- mortar university in that standpoint. We are located in Houghton, Michigan which is located in the Upper Peninsula part of Michigan. We have more than a 120 programs at the undergraduate level as well as 70 graduate degree programs as well. We are regionally accredited as well by the Higher Learning Commission. Recently we were ranked by Niche magazine as number one in best value colleges in the state of Michigan. As well as ranked 25th in the nation for the top STEM universities by Forbes magazine. As well as that same ranking from Forbes magazine we did come in 12th in the US for public universities where graduates earn their highest mid- career salaries. And as well as, bestcolleges. com we came in ranked 18th in the US for return of investment.

I will turn it over to Dr. Keranen to talk about why we should be earning a master's degree in statistics.

Dr. Melissa Keranen

Thanks Vinay. Let's first talk about the job opportunity.

The Bureau of Labor and Statistics has said that the employment of statisticians is expected to grow by 35% over a 10- year period. It was rated as the number two best business job and number six overall by U. S. News& World Report. It is number five as the best STEM job by U. S. News& World Report. It was rated number two in best low- stress, high- paying jobs, who wouldn't want that, by CNBC. And number five fastest growing job in the US by Bureau of Labor and Statistics. We're going to talk a little bit about what would you do as a statistician.

The role of a statistician is to look at patterns and look at information and what helps us describe the world or a human behavior. Dr. Melissa Keranen When you think about this, this can be applied to many areas that we look at in the world that we live in. For one example, the government cares about voting demographics. And people who are running for certain offices might like to study voting demographics to understand the people that they're living with and around. In technology, if you're a tech business or if you are any kind of a business really that's using the internet or whatever to market to your customers, then you're interested in consumer preferences and what do people want to buy. Those of us that work in medicine and that develop treatment and drugs for certain diseases, of course are really care about the safety of their treatments and so they will use statistics to help them understand that. The environment and the world around us want to know what impacts our environment, so we would care about statistics there. Athletes use statistics all the time to track their performance and to rank their athletes and to determine if they're improving. And then economics, they also use statistics to evaluate risks. Overall, industries use statistics in many different ways and the way that they get their information is the data that they're using and that comes from a variety of places. It might come from the research a lot of company uses, the internet, or social media or all other forms of media. All of these are ways that we gather our data to help us learn about the world around us. If a statistician is at work, we want to know what do they do with this information.

A statistician works just like any other scientist would. There's a process that they go through. The first step would be to explore the data. They're going to get that data. They're going to, first of all, look at that data and try to figure out, " Well, can I find some patterns in here? What does the status show me? Can that help me to try predict the future?" They're going to come up with a hypothesis, " Okay, I think this is what this means. Maybe we should design an experiment to try to test this, try to model this behavior." They will make a prediction, " Well, I think, based on this data, I think this is what's going to happen in the future." And then after performing the experiment, they're going to draw their conclusions. A statistician really needs a variety of different skills. They need to be able to understand how to model a situation using mathematics, be able to predict what's going to happen in the future, that's predictive modeling. Data mining is digging into data. They're going to look at their data. They're going to see if there's abnormalities, what the patterns are there. And usually they're dealing with massive amounts data so they have to know how to handle that data and how to process it. Statistical computing is basically the intersection between statistics and computer science. They're looking at, " Okay, what kind of algorithms do we need in order to process our data and what kind of algorithms may we need to develop or how are we going to compute this?" That's statistical computing. And then they also need to know how to design their experiment, " Where are we going to place certain information, into what categories and what kind of experiments are we going to apply in order to help us find our results?" It's also good to know that statistician often aren't only looking at numbers.

They aren't only doing statistics. They also have to remember that they're part of a team. If you become a statistician, you're going to essentially be part of a company. It's important that you understand the company as a whole and you understand how to communicate with people within your team that are not statisticians. You need to be able to understand the language of statistics but also to be able to communicate with others that are not familiar with that language. The skills that you need are largely communication skills. You have to be able to collaborate with other people that are part of your team, that are not statisticians. And you have to be able to understand the industry that you're working in so that you know how your results are going to affect the industry as a whole. According to the National Association of Colleges and Employers, verbal communication is actually the most important skill that a job candidate can have. It ranks 4.63 out of 5 versus technical knowledge which is 3.99 out of 5. If you want to become a statistician, the job outlook for you is good.

Almost 90% of America's industries use statistics daily and career outlooks reflect that. The expected jobs by 2029 is 57, 500 which is up 35% compare to 2019. And the average annual salary is $91, 160. It's important to recognize through all that, for statistician the education that you need is a little bit more than a bachelor's. In fact, most jobs do require a master's degree. Another thing to keep in mind is that the statistician can go many different directions with this degree.

The pathways, maybe you're interested in math, maybe you're interested in numbers, but you're also interested in the medical field or maybe you're interested in public health, maybe you're interested in marketing. There's lots of places where you can go with such a degree. You could see the examples there, health care, finance, engineering, manufacturing, public health, genetics, pharmacology, computer science, marketing, and there's even more. Just as an example, some of the companies that have hire Michigan Tech graduates, are Mayo Clinic, which probably everybody has heard of, Biostat Solutions is a biostatistical consulting company, AA Networks deals with IT services, Argus Informational and Advisory Services is a consulting business dealing with risk exposure and credit and Epic Systems is a software that is used in many hospital and clinics around the country. The other thing you have to keep in mind is, when you're looking for jobs you may not always look for statistician. Some job titles of former graduates include statistical programmer, or business intelligence developer, analyst. There's other job titles other than statistician that you might be interested in. Now, I'm going to turn this part of the presentation over to Dr. Sun.

Dr. Jiguang Sun

Yes. Thank you. I will give you guys a brief overview of the online master programs in applied statistics. There are 10 courses in total and a 30- credit hour. You can take one, seven- week course at a time. There are two courses per semester. We have fall, spring and summer. If you would like to take the accelerated format, you can complete as few as five semesters and that's less than two years. The program is fully online.

The next is the overview for the online certificate in applied statistics. You will need only three courses which is nine credit hours. Similar to the online ones, you can take one, seven- week course at a time. They are also two courses per semester. And if you do the accelerated format, you can complete the three courses in two semesters. Again, it's three start dates per academic year. Of course, it's also fully online.

Remember that if after you took the three courses for the certificate, and you decided to do the online master program, all the three course works will be applicable towards that degree. Here is the curriculum.

The department, together with the Keypath designed to provide our student a strong foundation in the following aspects. It includes techniques of applied statistics, there's a consideration of both traditional and modern statistics. Two very popular statistics softwares R and the SAS will be taught during the courses. The mathematical concepts underlying statistical techniques, these are probability and statistical inference will be build strongly in the courses.

You will also get familiar with the following additional skills. Like how to deal with large set data, messy data. How to report on the findings of a statistical analysis. And very importantly, how to communicate the technical results to non- technical persons.

This is a list of the courses. The core courses are probability and statistical inferences I and also the Statistical Methods. The rest, eight are elective courses. If you look at this slide, the course in blue, I believe, it's in light blue colors, they are the courses for the certificate. All the courses are for the online master program for applied statistics.

To guarantee the high quality of this online program. Our best instructors and the faculties are on board.

Phil Kendall, he got his master's in statistics from Michigan State. He teaches probability and statistical Inference I and II. He is a member of Michigan Tech Academy of Teaching Excellence. He got tons of experience in teaching introductory and advanced statistics.

Ray Molzon has a Ph. D. in statistics from Michigan Tech and teaches statistical methods. He is experienced and a popular instructor on campus. We also have excellent researchers and teachers to teach higher level or advanced courses.

We have Professor Kui Zhang. He got his Ph. D. in probability and statistics from Beijing University. He is the co- author of more than a 100 publications. He is also the Dave House endowed professor of Michigan Tech.

Yeonwoo Rho, she got her Ph. D. in statistics from University of Illinois. Her research area includes time series analysis and economics. Her report is funded by National Science Foundation.

Professor Quiying Sha got her Ph. D. in statistics from Michigan Tech. Her research area is statistical genetics and applied statistics. She is the co- author of over 60 publications. Her work are supported by the National Institute of Health. You guys probably already heard that she is also an endowed professor, Portage Health Foundation endowed professor.

Christina, I think I'm done.

Christina Walsh

Yes, thank you. Now we're going to move on. Vinay will present the online experience.

Vinay Patel

Perfect.

Online experience, as they mentioned, this program is a 100% online. So, you guy's don't ever have to worry about Houghton or wherever Houghton's located for that matter. Unless you guys want to come up for graduation or something like that, you guys are more than welcome to do that as well. But the virtual learning environment really does facilitate making sure that you guys are interacting with each other. As mentioned, statistics is not a field that's done independently. You guys have to learn how to work in groups and learn to work with each other whether as statisticians or non- statisticians. So we try to engage as really much in your class works so you get to interact with your faculty members. As mentioned, these are tenured faculty members at Michigan Tech. They do have office hours available. They're readily available to try work with you guys. They do try to make sure that there is something that they can do for you guys to help out in that type of stuff.

The nice part of this program though, is there's no set log- in times or anything like that. You kind of get to this from the comfort of your home. I usually tell most of you guys that, it doesn't really matter to us if watch the lectures at 2: 00 PM or 2: 00 AM. It's really whatever's convenient for you. The biggest thing is just making sure you get assignments done before the due dates and the deadline standpoint.

The best part of this program though, is being able to apply the content to your area of study. As mentioned, this is something that is cross discipline. There's not just one type field that you can go into when it comes to statistics, whether it's medicine, whether it's biostats, whether it's in some type of business situation, finance or something like that. You can really take a lot of information that's in this course work and throw out directly into what you're doing.

As well as you have a student success coach, that'll be supporting you along the ways, throughout the program. As well as a academic advisor that will be a faculty member here at Michigan Tech that'll be supporting you. That student success coach is going to be assigned to you, usually about six weeks before the start date and they're there to help you with registration, orientation, book store, making sure that you're able to get all the material you need in the course itself. For an online platform, we do use a tool called Canvas. If you have never taken online experience or anything like that, please do let me know. I can give you a tutorial with what Canvas actually looks like... It's very straightforward, it's very easy and manageable. It's very similar to like a blackboard for example, somebody sees that as well.

Lastly, here we do include all the software that you do need in your course work. We do have a software distribution center that's available. That allows you to take access to all those type of situations as well.

For our program- wise though, next steps for the admissions. Vinay Patel I really do highly encourage if you have not done your interview with me already, please do take some time in the said link that Christina mentioned to schedule your appointment with us. Even if you have done the interview already in the past and you want to reengage and talk with me about it, please do go ahead and use that link. And we could set- up a good date and time that matches your calendar with mine to talk about the program.

First and foremost, we do make sure that you have to have a bachelor's degree, of course from an accredited institution. We do require a very strong math background. Our statistics courses are housed there in math department there. We do want at least two semesters of calculus, anywhere between calculus I, II and III. At least one semester of an intro to linear algebra class as well as an intro to statistics class.

But the nice thing about this program is there's no GRE or GMAT requirement for the online programs. You don't have to worry about that.

Once you get your interview done with us and things like that, we'll go through the next steps with the application process. We do try to make this as streamlined as possible so it's really straightforward. I'm available to help out with any of these questions you guys my have.

But first and foremost, it's just completing online application. There's no fee for the online application. After that, you'll get access into what's called MyMichiganTech and that's where you'll upload all your documents. No need to mail us anything or anything along those lines. Your current CV, Resume, basically letting us know what you've been doing since you graduated on that side. One letter of recommendation is actually just required for the program. And then there's two student statements that you'll write. One would say personal statement, which is a little bit more about just who you are and kind of introducing yourself to the committee. As well as statement of purpose, that way the committee can understand why you want to do this program as well. And then any type of an official transcripts from any colleges, universities you've attended.

But like I mentioned, first step is to schedule date and time to talk to me about the program. And we can go into a lot more details about everything.

Christina Walsh

Great. Thank you Vinay.

Now, we're going to move on to our question and answer session. If you haven't already, go ahead and enter your questions in the Q& A box on the bottom of your screen. We will work through as many questions as we have time to today. Looks like we have a bit more time today so that's great.

Our first question is, I believe, for Dr. Keranen. It's about, let's see. I work in the finance field. Traditional research methods involve a lot of statistical analysis, however it seems like machine learning and AI techniques are gradually becoming more widely used. How do you compare statistics to those two fields? And second part, do this go hand in hand with statistics or does one overtake the others as far as job opportunities? You have insights there?

Dr. Melissa Keranen

Since Dr. Sha is the statistician here, I'm going to let her answer that question. She would have, probably, better insight. Ying could you answer that?

Dr. Qiuying Sha

Right now it's a very popular for machine learning and artificial intelligence. In our statistical program, we also have predictive modeling. That course is similar to machine learning. We do have rule how to handle large data. Then, the difference between the courses offered in our program and the computer science program, for example, we compare machine learning and predictive modeling.

The predictive modeling will focus on more like statistical models, and then how to clean data, and how to build the model, how to select variables. And for machine learning, more likely they concentrate on using tree- based models. That's a difference but it's also many overlaps. That's question. I forgot the... This is the first question what's the difference between machine learning, artificial intelligence and the program. I didn't recall the other question.

Christina Walsh

It's okay. The first part was, how do you compare statistics and the two fields? And then the second, do this go hand in hand with statistics or does one overtake the others as far as job opportunities?

Dr. Qiuying Sha

I think many over lappings between those two programming but our program more likely handle bigger data analysis based on statistical models. And there where machine learnings but other program they may compute the size like a artificial intelligence and the machine learning. They are some over lappings but also they are different.

Christina Walsh

Okay, great. The next question I have here, do graduates of the program end up statisticians in addition to statistical programmers and is there a difference between the two? I'm not sure who wants to take that, Dr. Sun or Dr. Sha.

Dr. Jiguang Sun

I believe there's some difference. If you are just statistical programmers, you probably do little research related. If you graduated with a master degree and you're in the company, you going to do some research and development. This is the difference I can see. This is just like when you do computer science. If you are just a programmer, you do the programming every day. If you do research, you're, probably, going to do end up with something like program manager or senior software engineer, right. It depends on the rank that you are seeking for.

Christina Walsh

Okay, great. Thank you. Dr. Sun, I think you mentioned modern statistics being covered earlier. What exactly does that include in the curriculum?

Dr. Jiguang Sun

I believe this is... Dr. Sha will comment on this better. Okay.

Dr. Qiuying Sha

You mean which course? I think it was just a statement that modern statistics was being covered in the course work. Yes, the predictive modeling class. And then, in the traditional statistical courses, you really talk about regression models, we talk about logistical models and the data set are relative small. In reality, where you really have real large and messy data, for example we have a missing data. And then you have full data, you really will assume for continuous variable, follow normal distribution, so then you also regress some.

Right now, the data is a very messy challenge. In that course, we talk about how to clean data, and how to impute the data and also we manipulate the models not just regression model and logistical model. And then we talk about neural network model, and we talk about the support vector machine model and many other up to date, very popular statistical models. That is really modern and very advanced.

Christina Walsh

Thank you. That was great. This next question is about the qualifications for the program. How do I know if I meet the basic qualifications to enter the certificate program and master's kind of review both of those? Vinay did you want to cover that?

Vinay Patel

Yeah. Sure. For the certificate program, as well as for the master's program, the admissions requirements are going to be the same with the foundation requirements. It's still going to be two semesters of calculus, one semester of linear algebra and one semester of a introduction to statistics type course.

Christina Walsh

Perfect. How much prior knowledge of statistics is needed, is it just that intro course?

Vinay Patel

Yeah. It's just that one intro class for statistics. The first two classes in the program, as mentioned, are going to be heavily stat theory classes anyway. So we will work with getting you caught up on that side. But that's the only reason why we need that one class for statistics.

Christina Walsh

Perfect. Are there financial aid resources for the certificate program?

Vinay Patel

There is not, unfortunately. The certificate program is nine credits. It's kind of a stand- alone program, so there's no financial aid.

Christina Walsh

Awesome. Thank you. Does MTU partner with any institutions or businesses for the program for helping place graduates? Dr. Keranen or Dr. Sun, you want to speak to that?

Dr. Jiguang Sun

I can jump in about this. We got many graduate students that have connections with the department. Sometimes they have a job opportunities, they will stand to the department. Officially, we don't have connections. The university admission, registrar office have the formal connections. But we always have email from our former graduate students and our collaborators that whenever they job opportunities. They're going to send us then we forward that to our graduate student. Hopefully that we can do the similar things to our online graduate students.

Christina Walsh

Wonderful. Thank you. Next question Vinay, is about military benefits. From funding standpoint, are there programs supported by GI Bill?

Vinay Patel

Oh yeah. I would say talk to your military education officer and see what you have available from a GI Bill standpoint, but you can absolutely use the GI Bill. We also have a tuition discount for students who have served in the military. It's called the National Graduate Service Fellowship. It does reduce your tuition about 33% as long as that student can provide us a DD 214 or something like that. But absolutely, if you have scheduled appointment, we can for sure talk in more details about the significant discount and by joining this program.

Christina Walsh

Wonderful. Dr. Sun you mentioned earlier about the accelerated pace for the master's program. Can you give a little bit more information and what that timeline looks like if they attend full time, like the summer starts and then the next summer, fall or spring?

Vinay Patel

If you want, Dr. Sun. I can handle that question, sir because it's more on admissions.

Dr. Jiguang Sun

Go ahead, please.

Vinay Patel

Yeah, no problem. There's two courses starting in the summer of 2021. If you continuously are enrolled taking the two classes and it's five semesters long, you would be done with the program by December of 2022. So you would have, basically, a summer semester, a fall semester and then you would have a spring, summer and fall and then you'd be done after five semesters.

Christina Walsh

Great. About how many hours of work is there per week? Let's see. Dr. Sha or Dr. Sun?

Dr. Qiuying Sha

That's depend, it depend on your background. Some of them can complete a shorter time, some of them take a longer time. I think we do have the criteria from Keypath so we don't expect the student working on the course work or model. I forget, is that 18 hours? Anybody remember? Yes, 18 hours. ... It was 15 to 20 hours is what we say.

Vinay Patel

Yeah. 15 to 20 is what we say on the average during our calls.

Dr. Qiuying Sha

Right. But it's really depend on your background. If your background are strong, you may take a less time. And if you need to make up or something it may take a little bit longer. But it should be less than 20 hours per week.

Christina Walsh

Great. There isn't any live sessions in this program, correct?

Dr. Qiuying Sha

We have full office hour. We use Zoom for office hour. So we can face to face and then talk. Other than that, we have other courses that we have a video you can watch, we have online material, and then we have full discussion, and then we also have full office hours. Office hours it depends instructor like to use Zoom so you can have face to face and ask him, ask other students. Yeah. That's a great-

Vinay Patel

No. Office hours in certain times. But the class itself is pre- recorded so you don't have to be on it on certain time.

Christina Walsh

Right. Vinay can you? you mentioned calculus I and calculus II, those are required pre- reqs, right?

Vinay Patel

Correct. Yes. They have to be at least two semesters of calculus anywhere between calculus I, II and III. Unfortunately, a business calculus does not work nor does a pre- calculus or anything like that. It officially starts off at Calculus I.

Christina Walsh

Okay. Can you confirm also the semester and course structure. Semester is 14 weeks, right?

Vinay Patel

Yeah, sure. So the way that the classes run are two courses per semester. You just never take two at the same time. You'll take one for seven weeks and then another class for seven weeks. And you have a week off as well in there. So in the spring semester you have a spring break in there. As well as in the fall semester you have the semester off, I believe, the week of Thanksgiving as well. So we just follow the same calendar that some other campus would. So 15 weeks with a one week break. It's not actually always a seven-one- seven. That week off can be, like the week of Thanksgiving for example versus like directly after you had seven- week session.

Christina Walsh

Wonderful. This next question is related to the pre- reqs. If they don't have the required pre- reqs yet, where should they go to acquire the courses to meet the requirements?

Vinay Patel

Yeah. The big thing is make sure you take them at a regionally accredited university. Michigan Tech does offer some of these course online. For example, we do offer a calculus II. We do offer a linear algebra class. We have a engineering statistics course available as well. I know I keep saying this but, schedule a call with me, I can talk to you about options that I've seen other students do, possibly, that may work for you as well. Because if you don't live in the state of Michigan, these classes are subject to out-of- state tuition because they are under bachelor's courses. But like I mentioned, you have schedule a time, let's talk and we can figure out a way to get you provisionally accepted for the program.

Christina Walsh

Great. What university accreditations are accepted?

Vinay Patel

Regionally, they have to be regionally accredited universities.

Christina Walsh

Okay. This next person, they've been out of school for a long time, will I be able to keep up with the material?

Dr. Qiuying Sha

Yeah. I think in our program we do have some students that they left college for a long time but if you willing to get... if you work hard and then you can catch up. And then we are trying to help as much, if we can either on the material or on the programming side. I think it's doable. For sure.

Christina Walsh

Do I need to have prior knowledge of SAS and R to be successful in the program, Dr. Sha?

Dr. Qiuying Sha

Yeah. You don't have to, but if you have any programming skills, any other language that will help. Even if you don't, we don't assume you'll know the programming. In the beginning of the course, like statistical method, we're going to walk you through how to use R, how to use the SAS. That's the basic how to start using R, how to start using SAS. Every course you'll learn how to use. And by graduate you will be very good, very comfortable on using SAS and the R. Also, we have course also. You can take other option, either use R or in many industry is very popular too.

Christina Walsh

That's great. Thank you. Vinay, excuse me, we just got a question about expected total cost for the program. Would you be able to review tuition and also any, I guess, for cost for tuitions, hardware other materials?

Vinay Patel

Yeah, sure. Tuition's broken into two categories. We don't do in- state or out- of- state or anything like that at Michigan Tech for the graduate school. It's broken into whether you're on the fellowship or non- fellowship. We can talk about it if you do qualify for the fellowship and what that tuition rate discount looks like and things like that. But for tuition and fees, it comes out to about $1,169 a credit hour. That does not include your text books. Textbooks kind of vary based on if you're renting them, buying them, reselling them, you're going to get them from Michigan Tech or Amazon or somewhere else. I have no way of estimating what the cost is with textbooks, unfortunately.

As mentioned, software is included from the software distribution center, so you don't have to worry about spending extra money on software and things like that. And then, any other materials, I don't know what your computer situation looks like, unfortunately. So I don't know if you needed to buy a new laptop or something like that. Most everyday computers would be fine for this program, so I don't know a way of estimating that.

But from a tuition fee standpoint, you're looking at about $1,169 a credit hour. The credit hours on average per course so it's about $3,500 and then 10 courses total in the program so estimated around about $35,000 for tuition and fees in the program.

Christina Walsh

And that's for the master's program you said?

Vinay Patel

Correct. Yes, for the master's program. And then if you're looking for the certificate program, it's nine credit hours, then you're looking at roughly, $1,169 times nine credit hours, so in that ballpark, it would be under $10,000 from that side.

Christina Walsh

Great. Thank you. Vinay, could you expand a little bit on the fellowship program?

Vinay Patel

Yeah, of course. It's National Service Graduate Fellowship. It's for any students who has served in any branch of the military, active or not, in that standpoint. As well as, Peace Corps, AmeriCorps on that side. When you fill out the online application, you'll check a box that says if you do qualify for this type of situation. And then basically, once you go into MyMichiganTech, you would just send in the proof of that service. So again, that could be a DD 214 for example. Once you've been accepted into the program and the fellowship has been approved from your side, there's nothing else you really have to do. You'll automatically be subject to that new rate. It drops the tuition rate to about 33% so it comes out to about, instead of $1,169, I believe it drops down to about $715 a credit hour. From a total cost standpoint, it drops, to the program, from $35,000 to roughly about $24,000.

Christina Walsh

Great. Thank you. All right. Looks like we're narrowing in on the questions that we've received so far. Last call for any questions. Let's see. The one other question that I had here. Dr. Sun or Dr. Sha, can give you give kind of example of what a typical week in a life of a student is there? What type of assignments can they expect?

Dr. Qiuying Sha

The assignments, it depends on different courses. Most of them will have weekly homework. You can see the weekly homework at the beginning of the week, we have all this scheduled weekly. I think you will expect that you have weekly home works. And then some of them will have a project. If we have a project that week, then the homework for the week will be less. One homework per week. How long it will take is really depends. Depends on the courses and also depends on your background. Exactly.

Christina Walsh

Are there any test? How are online tests usually administered?

Dr. Qiuying Sha

Yeah, there are test. I think it depend, some of them are doing project, some of them have test, some of them have two test, one mid- term, one final. Some test will be monitored. Many of them will be like a take- home or open book. It really depend on each instructor, how they arrange the course work. Also, depend on the project if the course is project- orientated, you'll make two presentations. The seven weeks and then no exams, and there's where you have take- home exams. Some of them will have two exams. It depend on the course.

Christina Walsh

Wonderful. Thank you. All right. That is all the questions that we've received for today. So, thank you all for a great question and answer session. I'll go ahead and wrap up the webinar for today. Thank you everyone for joining us today.

If you have additional questions following this session, go ahead and reach out to Vinay. His contact information is right there for you. As I mentioned at the start of the webinar, there are some links available to you in the resource section. If you're interested in learning more, or applying to the program, please those link to schedule an appointment with admissions and start your application. Also, as this webinar closes, a very short four- question survey will pop- up. We'd certainly appreciate any feedback or comments that you might have.

Finally, on- demand recording of this session will be emailed to you tomorrow should you like to view this presentation again and/ or share with others. Thank you again for joining us and have a great rest of your day.

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