Prospective graduate students

Graduate students have the flexibility to customize their program of study by selecting courses from a wide variety of areas.

In addition to these regular offerings, our faculty also routinely offer specialized courses, providing students with learning opportunities in cutting-edge areas and state-of-the-art expertise.

Doctoral students are required to and master’s students may elect to perform research for their degree.  Students work closely with their faculty mentors and conduct high-impact, innovative research in a variety of areas, with a cross-cutting emphasis on understanding problems and engineering solutions.

You can discover more about our research by reviewing abstracts, faculty research labs and groups, and faculty members.

Flagstaff offers an ideal, scenic environment for living and learning. With a four-season climate, amazing landscapes, and ample sunshine, you’ll discover outdoor adventures unlike anywhere else in the United States.

At 7000 feet elevation and in the midst of the largest ponderosa pine forest in the world, Flagstaff has drawn positive attention from a number of publications:

• Travel and Leisure magazine named Flagstaff among the top 10 Best College Towns in America.
• Time.com called it one of the nation’s happiest cities.
• Outside Magazine ranked Flagstaff as the 7th best town in the nation.
• Fodor.com named the city one of 20 College Towns We Love to Visit, citing Flagstaff’s nearly 700 acres of park land and 50 miles of trails.

Flagstaff offers a wide array of nearby recreation opportunities, including:

• Winter recreation: Snowboard or ski at Arizona Snowbowl, Northern Arizona’s ski resort located just 15 miles from downtown Flagstaff, or cross-country ski at the Nordic Village.
• Hike, run, or bike: Enjoy the 50 miles of hiking, mountain biking trails, and running tracks that are part of Flagstaff’s Urban Trail System, or sunbathe on Sedona’s red rocks and swim in Oak Creek, less than an hour’s drive to the south in Sedona.
• National Parks and Monuments: Flagstaff is surrounded by National Parks and Monuments, including being only one-and-a-half hours away from Grand Canyon National Park and minutes away from Walnut Canyon National Monument.
• Active campus life: You’ll find that there’s always something happening on the NAU campus, from athletic events, to theatrical plays, to musical performances, and everything in between.
• Vibrant community: Community events are constantly on offer in Flagstaff, including community theater, like Theatrikos and the Flagstaff Shakespeare Festival, and downtown events like the Flagstaff Community Farmers Market, First Friday Art Walk, Movies on the Square, and Heritage Square concerts.
• Nearby: Flagstaff is a destination in to itself, but also located nearby other places of interest, like being within a two-hour drive to Phoenix, Arizona and a three-and-a-half hour drive to Las Vegas, Nevada.

Admission into all of our graduate programs is competitive and there are no specific grades or exam scores that guarantee admission. The admissions process is based on a complete graduate studies application that contains all necessary information—the application is found online.

For all prospective PhD students, we require GRE exam scores as part of the applications process. International students may be required to officially report English proficiency test scores.

All applicants to any graduate program at Northern Arizona University must fulfill general admission requirements.

For additional requirements that are specific to our graduate programs, consult the corresponding University catalog entry (under the “Details” tab with the heading “Additional Admission Requirements”) for your program of interest:

• Mechanical Engineering PhD
• Masters of Science in Mechanical Engineering
• Masters of Engineering in Mechanical Engineering

There are many options to finance your graduate studies for students who cannot afford either the entire or part of the expense, including graduate assistantships, tuition waivers, and scholarships.

Outstanding incoming doctoral students may be nominated for an NAU Presidential Fellowship.

Many doctoral and master’s students in our department are supported through graduate assistantships, which fall in one of two categories: Graduate Teaching Assistantships (GTA) and Graduate Research Assistantships (GRA). GTA positions require that students provide instruction in courses and labs that support our undergraduate degree programs. GRA positions require that students contribute to the development funded research projects.

Full, 20-hour per week assistantships of both types include the following: a full tuition waiver, a waiver of fees for student health insurance, and a stipend paid to the student.  This should provide funding for most costs involved in attending NAU in addition to providing a stipend that can be used for living expenses.

The department offers GTA positions on a competitive basis. All students who apply to one of our graduate programs are automatically considered for available GTA positions.

Individual faculty award GRA to incoming or continuing graduate students through funding intended to support specific research projects, such as National Science Foundation or National Institutes of Health research grants. The best way for a student applying to our programs to be considered for a GRA is to first carefully review faculty research project abstracts and research profiles. Students should then contact individual faculty conducting research in an area of interest, share their background and specific area of research interest, provide a current resume or curriculum vita and any publications students have contributed to, and express their interest in a GRA position. Based on this information, faculty may elect to make GRA offers to highly-qualified students.