Graduate classes are relatively small and graduate students have ample opportunity to become involved in faculty research. Students are also provided many opportunities to interact with other graduate students and to attend colloquia that feature presentations by faculty, outside speakers, and dissertation candidates. The small number of students accepted into the program also makes it possible to fund almost all graduate students throughout their entire graduate careers. The graduate program is designed to be completed in four to six years. In the first two years of the program, students attend seminars, write a research paper, and attempt a comprehensive examination.
Students draft a dissertation prospectus and defend it before their dissertation committee.
Students spend their fourth year and beyond conducting their dissertation research, writing their dissertation, and defending their completed project before their committee. The department also offers a variety of courses that are of a methodological or epistemological nature. The following discussion provides more detailed information regarding the four major subdisciplines and the methodology faculty and curriculum. American Politics American politics cannot be studied at UCSD in isolation from the work being done by comparativists, international relations specialists, and theorists. American specialists within the program attempt to facilitate discussions with others by embedding discussions of American institutions and practices into broad theoretical and comparative perspectives.