MEAM Seminar

Catalog description

The seminar course has been established so that students get recognition for their seminar attendance as well as to encourage students to attend. Students registered for this course are required to attend weekly departmental seminars given by distinguished speakers from around the world. In order to obtain a satisfactory (S) grade, the student must not only attend more than 70% of the departmental seminars but also provide satisfactory answers to the mini-essay assignments (shown as quizzes on Canvas) about three of those seminars. It is recommended that the student pick the seminars closest to their research interests, but they may choose any seminar they wish. Up to two of the seminars to be counted toward the MEAM 699 requirement may come from outside MEAM. To be counted, a non-MEAM seminar must be part of an established Penn seminar series that is focused on engineering, science, mathematics, computation, or other technical discipline. A mini-essay quiz must be completed for each non-MEAM seminar. There will be three such quizzes distributed through the semester, graded pass/fail. Participation in the seminar course will be documented and recorded on the students transcript. In order to obtain their degree, doctoral students will be required to accumulate six seminar courses and MS candidates two courses. Under special circumstances, i.e. in case of conflict with a course, the student may waive the seminar requirement for a particular semester by petition to the Graduate Group Chair.