ENGL 698D - Capstone Course
ENGL 698D Graduate Project Course is the capstone course for the English MA. It is meant to be a culminating experience taken after you have completed at least two courses specific to your option. The idea is to build upon your learning in those previous courses. You should therefore plan to take courses in your option early in your MA career. You are not allowed to enrol in ENGL 698D unless you have completed the necessary courses and you are in your final two semesters.
What is a Graduate Project?
Graduate Projects are projects that you complete in the semester when you take ENGL 698D. They are not the same as a thesis and are generally shorter. For further details, see the section on Graduate Projects and the ETD Process below.
The following information will help you to determine whether you are qualified to take ENGL 698D in the next semester when it is offered.
Creative Writing Option¶
You must have completed at least two of the following courses in the semester prior to enrolling in ENGL 698D:
- ENGL 512
- ENGL 608
- ENGL 609
- ENGL 622
- ENGL 652
Literature Option¶
You must have completed at least two of the following courses in the semester prior to enrolling in ENGL 698D:
- ENGL 525*
- ENGL 595*
- ENG 617
- ENGL 630*
- ENGL 638
* These courses may have letter suffixes to indicate their content. However, they all fulfil the same requirements.
Rhetoric and Composition Option¶
You must have completed at least two of the following courses in the semester prior to enrolling in ENGL 698D:
- ENGL 513
- ENGL 651
- ENGL 654
Important
- Courses used to fulfil the following categories do not contribute towards your eligibility to take ENGL 698D: Introduction to Graduate Studies in English, Seminar in Genre Studies, Seminar in Cultural or Textual Studies, Seminar in Language and Linguistics, Electives, and graduate-level seminars outside your option.
- Other courses may occasionally qualify but are offered rarely.
Graduate Projects and the ETD Process¶
As stated above, the Graduate Project is not the same as a thesis, which the English Department no longer offers. A Graduate Project is shorter and normally based on a revision or expansion of work you have done in a previous class. However, because it is a culminating experience, it is considered the same as a masters thesis (or doctoral) dissertation for bureaucratic purposes only.
All culminating experience projects (graduate projects, theses, or disserations) are required to be registered with the University's Electronic Thesis and Dissertation system, or ETD. You must do this in the semester when you graduate. If you are not graduating at the end of the semester when you take ENGL 698D, you will likely go through the ETD process in the following semester.
Important
The Graduate Adviser contacts all students eligible to graduate at the beginning of the semester to provide instructions for beginning the ETD process. If you fail to meet the deadlines, you will not be allowed to graduate.
Check your CSUN email address frequently!
Both the University instructions and the ETD system itself are intended for English Department graduate projects, so we have to take special steps to make sure the process is valid. Here are some important differences in how English Department Graduate Projects are handled.
- You will not submit your entire project to the system. Instead, you will submit a 350-word abstract (summary description of your project).
- You will not pick your committee members. Your committee chair is your ENGL 698D instructor, your second member is the other ENGL 698D instructor in the same semester, and the third member is the Graduate Adviser.
The ETD process is completed in three phases, each with set deadlines. The English Department deadlines are earlier then the University deadlines. Make sure you check your email regularly for reminders and instructions.
The University has very precise requirements for the format of the materials you submit in the ETD process. In is something of an exercise in following directions.