November 21, 1938

Dr. W. D. Walters

Department of Chemistry

The University of Rochester

Rochester, New York

Dear Dr. Walters:

I am requesting that a copy of our new catalogue be sent to you as soon as it is available, which will be about a month. The brief answers given below to your questions are in some cases amplified in the catalogue.

Preliminary examinations for admission to candidacy are given to graduate students working for the Ph.D. during the first year of graduate study or the first half of the second year. These are three-hour written examinations in colloid, organic, and physical chemistry and one half hour oral examination in general inorganic chemistry, in addition to French and German. Proficiency in research must also be shown before the student is admitted to candidacy. About one and one half year of work is required for the doctorate after admission to candidacy. Periodic examinations are not given, but examinations are held in some graduate courses. The final examination for the Ph.D. is usually given toward the end of the last year. This is a three-hour oral examination. It covers the thesis and related fields, and all other branches of the major and minor subjects as well. We have a special requirement for doctor's examination, consisting in the preparation of ten or twelve propositions by the candidate which he is to be prepared to defend at his final examination. About half of these propositions relate to his thesis and major field of interest and the others are to have a somewhat broader significance. We adopted this scheme three years ago in order to give graduate students some incentive to develop his originality and especially to help him to recognize unsettled questions which might be used as a basis for further research. This scheme seems to be working reasonably well.

Yours truly,

Linus Pauling

LP/jr