To complete the program you should take at least 28 courses hours (7 courses) with a minimum final grade of C AND (AND gate) with the minimum average of B. At UIC every course has 4 hours/week (= 5 CFU at PoliMi) and you can choose a maximum number of 4 exam during your first semester in Chicago.
During your first joint semester you should take the following courses at PoliMi:
- High Performance Processors and Systems (UIC 569) – that have to replace Advanced Computer Architectures in your study plan (reason to sumbit an automonous study plan)
- Formal Methods for Concurrent and Real-Time Systems (UIC 545)
- Computer Security (UIC 587)
You can take up to 2 courses out of your department, but be aware that an A at UIC will be mapped with a 30 at PoliMi, not with a 30L. All the courses in the joint program are one shot, so you can take the exam only once in the first available exams session (example: you take a 2nd semester course so you can do the exam only once and it should be during the summer exams sessions). The UIC courses codes are explained in the following image
Thesis
You will graduate twice, so you will have to find a thesis advisor both at UIC and at PoliMi. At UIC you defend your thesis, whereas at PoliMi you have a thesis speech. At UIC you can have 3 exits after a defense:
- passed: congratulations! You may have small things to fix, but you are done!
- conditions: the things that you have to fix are not small, in the worst case you have to go through the defense once more.
- failed: you are not yet close to your title. You have to go through your work once more and do a new defense