Directed Research

Graduate Students: No.  CSCI 590 and CSCI 790 Directed Research is credit or no credit.  It is not graded.  You can only earn units toward the degree.
Undergraduate Students: Yes. You are assigned a letter grade for CSCI 490 Directed Research.  It counts toward your GPA and you earn units toward your degree, typically these are technical elective units.

Students who began in Spring 2017 and earlier: A maximum combination of 4 units of CSCI 590 Directed Research and ENGR 596 Internship can be used toward the M.S. program.

Students who began in Fall 2017 and later: A maximum combination of 2 units of CSCI 590 Directed Research and 2 units of CSCI 591 Research Colloquium can be used toward the M.S. program.  Internships do not count for credit in the M.S. Program. Please check in with your department advisor to see if your program is eligible.

M.S. students can only take a 1-2 unit Directed Research.  A maximum of 2 units can be taken for credit toward the M.S. degree, so you can either take 1 unit of CSCI 590 twice, or do the course once for 2 units.  The number of units should be something that you discuss with your Professor and Advisor.
Undergraduate students should consult with their Professor regarding the appropriate number of units. Keep in mind that 3 units of research is roughly supposed to be the same amount of time as a 3 unit class. Typically, each unit represents an hour of class time and two hours of outside-of-class study time.  So, a student taking a 3 unit Directed Research could expect to spend about an average of 9 hours per week on the course.  A student taking a 4 unit Directed Research could expect to spend an average of about 12 hours per week on the course.