PhD General Advising for Registration

New PHD Student Registration Guidelines - First Semester (Fall Term) General Advising

We are excited you are joining our team this August! This site is designed to give you guidance on registering for Fall 2024 courses. All incoming PhD students will be assigned a Program of Study Committee in September. This committee will help you select what courses you should take going forward and ensure you are taking courses to prepare you for your research and qualifying exam.  Effective Fall 2022 term, all first-year PhD students must register for a minimum of 12 credit hours during Fall and Spring term in their first year, regardless of any other fellowships or appointments they may hold.

International Students

International students must check-in at the International Student and Scholar Services Office (ISSS). Check-in details and schedules are available on the ISSS website. International students must arrive on campus by the start date listed on your I-20 or DS-2019.

Registration

Please check your "Time Ticket" in Student Self-service, to register for Fall 2024 courses.  Your Time Ticket is the earliest time you are authorized to register.  We highly recommend that you register as soon as possible after your Time Ticket opens. With increased enrollments in the Siebel School of Computing and Data Science and on campus, CS courses tend to fill up quickly. Therefore, we request that you register as close to this date as possible.

Steps to Complete for Course Registration

• To start the registration process, you must first setup your NetID and password. The instructions for this were given to you in your "official offer letter" from the Graduate College. If you missed the link, please go to http://www.grad.illinois.edu/quick-guide.
• Go to http://registrar.illinois.edu/registration-procedures to sign up for classes. To review the courses that will be offered in computer science, please visit the Course Explorer. 
• Courses at the 400- and 500-level carry graduate credit.
• All first-semester PHD students ARE REQUIRED to register for either CS 591 PHD orientation seminar! This is the required orientation seminar for all new PHD students.
• Effective Fall 2022 term, all first-year PhD students must register for a minimum of 12 credit hours during Fall and Spring term in their first year, regardless of any other fellowships or appointments they may hold.
• Effective Fall 2022 term, all first-year PhD students are required to enroll in a minimum of 4 credit hours of CS 597 Individual Study credits per semester with one faculty member in their first year. Additional information about the CS 597 registration process will be sent to students in late May.

Number of Minimum Credit Hours to Register for Fall Term

• Note: ALL new CS PhD students starting in Fall 2024 MUST register for 12 credit hours in their first year, in Fall '24 and Spring '25 terms.
• Departmental (Qualifying) Fellowship - 12 credit hours in Fall and Spring terms of first year
• RA or TA Assistantship Appointment - 9 credit hours
• Combined RA or TA Assistantship Appointment + Departmental (Qualifying) Fellowship - 9 credit hours
• Qualifying Grainger College of Engineering, Graduate College, or External Fellowship - Registration requirement is subject to fellowship terms with a minimum of 9 credit hours

Recommended Courses by Research Area for 1st Semester PHD Grads

Here are the courses offered in Fall 2024 by research area. Please note that you are not required to take all courses listed under each area. This is only a list of courses to choose from based on your research interests.

Architecture, Compilers, and Parallel Computing

• CS 426 - Compiler Construction
• CS 433 - Computer System Organization
• CS 483 - Applied Parallel Programming
• CS 598 Special Topics (choose one with a professor you may be interested in working with and/or a course of interest)

Artificial Intelligence

• CS 440 - Artificial Intelligence
• CS 441 - Applied Machine Learning
• CS 442 - Trustworthy Machine Learning
• CS 444 - Deep Learning for Computer Vision
• CS 445 - Computational Photography
• CS 446 - Machine Learning
• CS 447 - Natural Language Processing 
• CS 540 - Deep Learning Theory
• CS 542 - Statistical Reinforcement Learning 
• CS 543 - Computer Vision
• CS 545 - Machine Learning for Signal Processing
• CS 546 - Advanced Topics in Natural Language Processing 
• CS 598 Special Topics (choose one with a professor you may be interested in working with and/or a course of interest)

Bioinformatics and Computational Biology

• CS 466 - Introduction to Bioinformatics
• CS 581 - Algorithmic Genomic Biology 

Computers and Education

• CS 500 - Current Topics in Computing Education Research

Database and Information Systems

• CS 410 - Text Information Systems
• CS 411 - Database Systems
• CS 412 - Introduction to Data Mining
• CS 511 - Advanced Data Management 
• CS 512 - Data Mining Principles
• CS 514 - Advanced Topics in Network Science
• CS 598 Special Topics (choose one with a professor you may be interested in working with with and/or a course of interest)

Interactive Computing

• CS 409 The Art of Web Programming
• CS 415 Game Development
• CS 418 - Interactive Computer Graphics
• CS 445 - Computational Photography
• CS 465 - User Interface Design
• CS 567 - Social Signals and Social Media 
• CS 598 Special Topics (choose one with a professor you may be interested in working with with and/or a course of interest)

PL-FM-SE

• CS 421 - Programming Languages & Compilers
• CS 422 Programming Language Design
• CS 427 - Software Engineering I
• CS 475 - Formal Models of Computation
• CS 476 - Program Verification
• CS 521 - Advanced Topics in Programming Systems
• CS 527 - Topics in Software Engineering
• CS 598 Special Topics (choose one with a professor you may be interested in working with with and/or a course of interest)

Scientific Computing

• CS 450 - Numerical Analysis
• CS 554 - Parallel Numerical Algorithms
• CS 598 Special Topics (choose one with a professor you may be interested in working with with and/or a course of interest)

Security and Privacy

• CS 461 - Computer Security I 
• CS 562 - Advanced Topics in Security, Privacy, and Machine Learning 
• CS 563 - Advanced Computer Security 

Systems and Networking

• CS 423 - Operating Systems Design
• CS 424 - Real-Time Systems
• CS 425 - Distributed Systems
• CS 437 - Topics in Internet of Things 
• CS 438 - Communication Networks
• CS 439 - Wireless Networks
• CS 461 - Computer Security I
• CS 537 - Advanced Topics in Internet of Things (IoT)  
• CS 563 - Advanced Computer Security
• CS 598 Special Topics (choose one with a professor you may be interested in working with with and/or a course of interest)

Theory and Algorithms

• CS 473 - Algorithms
• CS 579 - Computational Complexity 
• CS 580 - Topics in Algorithmic Game Theory 
• CS 598 Special Topics (choose one with a professor you may be interested in working with with and/or a course of interest)