Portland-State-University 2016-2017 Bulletin

Fast Track BS+MS Program

Since the amount of knowledge required for state-of-the-art design is much greater than can be gained in a four-year BS program, a Master’s degree is now considered the “career” degree in the Electrical and Computer Engineering field. An ECE graduate who enters the field with a BS degree is expected to obtain a Master’s degree as part of his/her long term career advancement. Graduates who enter the profession with Master’s degrees start with considerably higher salaries and are eligible for more advanced positions.

The usual time required to directly obtain a BS in Electrical Engineering or a BS in Computer Engineering and an MS in Electrical and Computer Engineering is 4 years for the BS and an additional 5 quarters for the MS. This total of more than five and a half years is financially difficult and excessively delays entry into the industry. The Fast Track BS+MS program significantly shortens this path for top students by allowing up to 15 credits of ECE graduate credits to be used for both the BSEE degree or the BSCMPE degree and the MSECE degree.

Admission criteria

Students will apply for this program using an online application form that is a slightly modified version of the standard graduate application form. Since many ECE students are making their way through their programs on a part time basis and are therefore ready to enter the program at different times, students may apply to enter the program during any quarter. A GRE score is not required. The admission criteria for the program are as follows:

  • Admitted to the ECE Department for BSEE or BSCMPE
  • 3.3 cumulative GPA
  • 3.3 upper division major GPA with at least 16 credits of upper division ECE classes
  • One ECE faculty recommendation

Admission process and program flow

Applications for this program will be processed by the Graduate Program Director just as regular graduate applications are. When a student is accepted, he/she will be assigned an ECE Faculty Advisor who is an expert in the MS coursework track choice stated in the application. Since the M.S. tracks closely parallel the coursework tracks in the BS programs, the MS track chosen will usually be just an extension of the track the applicant is pursuing in his/her undergraduate program. In most cases, the 400 level senior classes specified in an undergraduate track have both 400 and 500 levels available and the 500 level versions of these courses are included in either the Core list or the Depth and Breadth list for the related graduate level track. With Advisor approval, students in the Fast Track BS + MS program will take the 500 level versions of these classes and use up to 15 credits of these to satisfy both BS requirements and MS requirements. Note that 3 credits from a 4 credit class can be used to bring the shared total up to 15 credits but all shared classes must have grades of B or higher.