Graduate Program FAQ

Absolutely YES! You MUST contact prospective faculty mentors at NAU Biological Sciences who do research in the area you wish to study.

Introduce yourself and ask faculty members who you might like to work with if they are accepting new graduate students. If they are, tell them about your background, coursework, etc. Tell them why you are interested in working with them and earning your master’s degree or doctorate under their mentorship. Please be sure to understand the mentors’ areas of research and know why you want to work with them. This is a good time to ask potential mentors if your credentials and education are adequate, or if updated coursework might be needed before or after admission to the program. Ask the prospective mentor, once s/he knows something about you, if they would be willing to sponsor your application if it comes up for review for admission to the Biological Sciences graduate program. Please note that you cannot be admitted to the NAU Biological Sciences graduate program unless an NAU faculty member stands up during the admissions review process and says that s/he is interested in taking you on as a graduate student and can support you financially with a TA-ship, RA-ship, or other mechanism. At that point (i.e., only when that expression of interest/support is made by the faculty member) will the Graduate Program Committee review your application for admission, and rank you relative to other grad applicants who also have a potential faculty mentor. How you rank relative to other committed candidates at that point will determine whether you are offered admission. Therefore, your first step is to try to make a connection with an NAU faculty member and see if there is a good fit for you here at NAU.

Historically, the Department of Biological Sciences has required completion of a thesis-based master’s degree as a criterion for admission to the Ph.D. program. Completion of a master’s degree before a doctoral program provides the student an opportunity to demonstrate her/his abilities for graduate studies, and for the faculty advisor to evaluate the same. Some faculty members will expect their students to complete a thesis-based master’s degree, and some will expect research experience equivalent to a master’s thesis before she/he will support a student’s entry to doctoral level studies. At the request of a sponsoring faculty member, a new applicant for graduate studies can be considered by the Graduate Program Committee for direct admission to the Ph.D. program without already having completed a thesis-based master’s degree. Criteria that might qualify an applicant for direct entry include:

Demonstrated promise for independent research development, design, interpretation and presentation

• previous research experience as an undergraduate student or associated with post-baccalaureate work, with reference letters attesting to the applicant’s abilities; and/or
• research presentation(s) at regional, national or international conferences in the profession, with reference letters attesting to the applicant’s abilities; and/or
• co-authorship(s) of peer-reviewed publication(s), with reference letters attesting to the applicant’s abilities

Demonstrated promise for success in graduate level course work in Biological Sciences and supporting areas germane to the student’s area(s) of study

• strong undergraduate grade point average in a life science degree program and supporting science courses; and/or
• strong performance on the GRE (earlier format), such as a composite score (verbal, quantitative and writing) with a percentile of 70% or higher

All applicants must have earned a bachelor’s degree from an accredited college or university, and we expect that the bachelor’s degree will be in a biological science or other science closely related to their expected field of graduate study. Applicants holding non-science bachelor’s degrees but with very significant post-baccalaureate or undergraduate minor concentrations in biologically-oriented science can also be considered for admission to the NAU Biological Sciences graduate program, with strong mentor support.

While there are no specific biological sciences, math, or chemistry courses required for admission to the NAU Biological Sciences program, this does not mean that there are no course requirements at all—it is just that each faculty mentor looks for different sets of classwork experience, research experience, grades, test scores, letters of recommendation, and personal goals in their prospective graduate students (talk to your potential faculty—see above—communicating with potential mentors is critical for any admission application to the NAU Biological Sciences graduate program).

Typically, all of our admitted graduate students are offered some type of graduate assistantship (either TA or RA). A few are admitted on competitive fellowships (these are not always available, please talk to potential mentors to see if any may apply to you). We do not ordinarily admit students without offering them some support, unless the applicant states that they are self-supporting.

The graduate assistantship stipend depends on whether you will be entering the MS or PhD Program, and whether you will be a TA or RA.  Please contact your potential NAU biology faculty mentor (major professor) or reach out directly to our graduate program – AskBioGrad@nau.edu.

Minimum undergraduate GPA for regular admission is 3.0 (0n a 0-4 scale).

No, we do not use the rotation system. You must have an assigned mentor before you can be admitted to the NAU Biological Sciences graduate program (see above).

Typically, 75-100 apply, and 15-20 are admitted. This varies somewhat year-to-year, depending on applicant pool and grant funding situations of individual faculty.

The Biology department at NAU no longer requires the GRE test for consideration for admission to its MS or PhD programs. Students may still submit GRE scores, but they will not be used in the graduate student selection process.

All applications are submitted on-line through the Office of Graduate and Professional Studies. Please go to the Office of Graduate and Professional Studies admissions website to get started.

The deadline for submission of your complete application (all letters, transcripts, GRE scores, etc.) can be found on this website.