To satisfy the written communication skill requirement each student must write a scholarly document, as either its sole author or its primary author (if co-authored), that is at least the quality of a Carnegie Mellon technical report. The student obtains written final approval of the document from at least two faculty members and one graduate student.
This document must be a scholarly paper with references to the literature that could be sent for peer review. It can be
Annotated bibliographies, user manuals, and reference manuals do not qualify because they do not require the same kind of explication, organizational, and summarization skills needed to write a conference- or journal-like publication.
It cannot be
The student should iterate with at least one faculty member, not necessarily the advisor, in writing this document. To determine whether the writing requirement has been satisfied, the student eventually must get at least two faculty members and one graduate student to read the document, to provide written feedback by filling out a Writing Review Form (available from the Associate Department Head), to meet and discuss this feedback, and to give final approval by signing the form accordingly. The student then gives these three (or more) signed forms to the Associate Department Head who keeps copies in the student's file and indicates in the student's records that the requirement has been satisfied.
Students are responsible for asking the appropriate faculty members and graduate student to help them with satisfying their writing requirement.
We expect students to be able to satisfy this requirement within their first three years and prior to their thesis proposal.
Computer Science Ph.D. students are welcome to enroll in the undergraduate communications course, required of undergraduate majors, to enhance their writing skills; however, taking it does not serve to satisfy the written communication skills requirement.