Ph.D. Minor Requirements

Students need not formally apply to enroll in the minor; any student currently in good standing in the Graduate School may elect to complete the minor by fulfilling the requirements and filing a program completion form with the Director of Graduate Studies of Population Studies.

All students must take one of two core required courses.   PA 5301, Population Methods and Issues in the U.S. and the Third World teaches basic demographic methods, covers population trends and policy issues in the United States and the world, and explores a wide range of topics studied by demographers, via case studies. SOC 5090, World Population Issues teaches population trends, population dynamics, and the various factors that influence the volume and distribution of populations across the globe; exposes students to key theories and central methodologies in social demography; and examines key policy questions in the management and engineering of population dynamics across the globe.

In addition to the core course, Doctoral students will take at least nine credits from the list of approved courses. All courses should be from the same subject area and may not be in a student’s major field. A student may petition the DGS to waive the requirement that all courses be from the same subject area if, for example, a student’s planned dissertation topic is closely related to specific courses in two different areas within the Population Studies minor. A total of twelve credits is required for the minor at the doctoral level. Students must register for all courses A/F; courses taken on a pass/fail basis may not count toward the minor (with the exception of PubH 6628, which is currently offered only S-N).

Once a student has completed the requirements for the minor, he or she will file a program completion form with the Director of Graduate Studies. The DGS will approve the form and notify the Sociology Department for formal certification.

Inclusion of courses not on the approved curriculum. Students may petition for a particular topics course or a course in which they completed a significant Population Studies project to be included in their program of study. The Curriculum Oversight Committee will review these petitions to determine whether a particular course is appropriate for the minor program curriculum. For example, students enrolled in PubH 6035 “Applied Research Methods” whose class data analysis project is on a Population Studies topic can petition to have the course included in their course of study.

Courses taken prior to Fall 2003. Students who completed any of the courses included in the minor program’s approved curriculum in academic years 2001-02 or 2002-03 may count those courses toward completion of the minor program. Students who completed any of the courses included in the minor program’s approved curriculum prior to Fall 2001 may petition to have the course included in their minor program.

Note for students who have already filed degree programs with the Graduate School: If you have already filed your official degree program identifying a supporting program you must petition the Graduate School to change your program if you now wish to include the Population Studies minor instead. If you have already filed a program with one minor and now wish to switch to Population Studies, you must petition the Graduate School to change your program. If you are a Ph.D. student in either of these circumstances and have already taken the preliminary oral examination, you may be unable to change your program without retaking the exam. Please consult the Graduate School’s Student Services and Progress Office for more information.

In accordance with Graduate School rules, students may not apply courses in their major field of study to the minor program in Population Studies.