Professional Master’s in Computer Science (MSCPS) Degree Requirements

Table of Contents

The Graduate School provides general requirements for the Master of Science in all departments at CU Boulder. The following requirements specifically pertain to students pursuing a Master of Science in the Department of Computer Science. It supplements the Graduate School requirements; in all cases not specifically mentioned below, the general Graduate School requirements are understood to apply.

Advising

As a course-based MS student in the Department, you have an academic advisor assigned to you from day one. The academic advisor acts as a strategic guide to help you manage the structural requirements of your degree. They ensure you maintain proper academic standing, meet administrative deadlines, and transition smoothly into your professional career. Specifically, they help you with the following -

Curriculum and Milestone Mapping
  • Reviewing Degree Requirements: They verify that your selected courses satisfy rigorous degree and concentration requirements.
  • Managing Course Logistics: They help navigate prerequisites, resolve registration overrides, and manage credit transfers.
Policy Navigation and Administration
  • Processing Official Petitions: They review and submit paperwork for leaves of absence, extension requests, or changing specializations.
  • Enforcing Academic Standing: They monitor your GPA to ensure it complies with departmental, College and Graduate School policies.
Campus Resource Integration

MSCPS Plan / Subplan Options

While pursuing the course based MS degree in CS, you may select between two options:

Option - General Track (no subplan):

  • Complete 30 credit hours of graduate coursework, according to the degree requirements listed on this page, including the following:
    • 9 hours - Bin/Breadth courses
      • You must earn a grade of ‘B’ or better to satisfy each of the three BIN/breadth course requirements.
    • 6 hours - Project courses
      • Students must complete both project courses from one project course sequence.
      • Students must earn grades of ‘B’ or better in both courses.
      • Students cannot count just one project course to the degree.
    • 15 hours - Elective courses
      • You may take up to two, approved, non-CS courses.

Option - Subplan 

  • Complete 30 credit hours of graduate coursework, according to the degree requirements listed on this page, including the following:
  • 9 hours - Bin/Breadth courses
    • You must earn a grade of ‘B’ or better to satisfy each of the three BIN/breadth course requirements.
  • 6 hours - Project courses
    • Students must complete both project courses from one project course sequence.
    • Students must earn grades of ‘B’ or better in both courses.
    • Students cannot count just one project course to the degree.
  • 15 hours - Elective courses
    • You may take up to two, approved, non-CS courses.
    • Any non-Computer Science courses that can count towards a subplan will count against the two maximum allowable non-CS classes.
  • Subplan courses
    • Must complete at least 12 credit hours of eligible subplan courses with a grade of ‘B’ or better in each course.
    • Students can satisfy subplan requirements by counting eligible BIN and/or Elective courses towards the subplan requirements. This means:
      • Students may count an eligible course towards BOTH a BIN/breadth requirement AND a subplan requirement.
      • Students may count an eligible course towards BOTH an Elective requirement AND a subplan requirement.

  • Available MSCPS subplans include:

Course Requirements

The course-based, Professional MS in Computer Science (MSCPS) requires 30 total credit hours of approved graduate-level coursework.

View the pre-fall 2019 course requirements 

Bin / Breadth requirement (9 credit hours)

To earn a Computer Science Research MS degree, you must earn a B or better (not a B-) in at least one 5000-level course (not 6000 or higher) from each of the three bins. By petition to the Graduate Committee, similar transferred graduate work done elsewhere may be used to satisfy part of this requirement. 

Computer Science courses are listed in the three different breadth bins below.

  • All three breadth courses must have a grade B or better.

For details about Computer Science BIN/breadth requirements check here: Breadth Course Bins.

Pre-Fall 2019 Breadth Requirements 

Projects / Capstone requirement (6 credit hours)

Elective courses requirement (15 credit hours)

  • 15 credit hours of graduate-level coursework (5000 level and above) offered at CU Boulder with the following restrictions:
    • Students may take no more than 6 total credit hours of non-CSCI classes.
    • Exactly three (3) credit hours of the Professional Internship class (CSCI 6930) can count as an Elective course.
    • Professional MSCPS students cannot count any research-related courses towards their degree:
      • CSEN MS / PhD Research courses (for ex., CSCI 5000, CSCI 5100, CSCI 6000, CSCI 6100, CSCI 6200).
      • Any other one-credit research seminar-based courses (for ex. ATLS 7000, CSCI 7772, CSCI 7412, CSCI 7422).
      • Independent study courses.
    • MS / MSCPS students may not take Network Engineering Fundamentals classes (CSCI 5010; CSCI 5020; CSCI 5030) and count them towards their CSEN MS / MSCPS degree.
    • Credits from the MS-DS Bridge Courses, General Data Science Courses and the following courses DO NOT count towards any CS graduate degree requirements:
      • DTSC 5501 (3) Data Structures and Algorithms
      • CSCI 5102 (3) AI-Enhanced Data Mining
      • CSCI 5122 (3) Neural Networks and Deep Learning for Data Science
      • CSCI 5612 (3) Machine Learning for Data Science
      • For more information check class notes

Transfer Credit

Please review the Graduate School Rules for Transfer Credits.

Research Hours

Students opting for course based MS degree do not have the thesis option or the independent study research option, as this is a “course-only” degree. The research-oriented plan is only available to research-based MS degree students.

Adequate Progress

  • Please review the Graduate School Rules for Adequate Progress.
  • Graduate students who have completed at least one semester at CU Boulder, may request a Leave of Absence if they have extenuating circumstances that prevent them from taking coursework for a certain amount of time. Click here to learn more about Leave of Absence at CU Boulder.

Grades

The department requires that no grades lower than a B can be counted toward the capstone project requirements, subplan and breadth requirements. Department requirements supercede Grad School requirements. Please review the Graduate School Rules for Grades and Quality of work.

Time Limit

All requirements for the course based MS degree must be completed within four years of the start of course work.

Switching to Various Master’s Degree options

You may switch between the research-based and course-based MS degree options once for genuine academic reasons on a case-by-case basis via petition to the Graduate Committee. For more information please check here.

Academic Standards

Minimum Grades & GPA Requirements

Students must complete a total of 30 credit hours of approved graduate level course work with a grade of C or better and a cumulative GPA of at least 3.00.

Any student, who fails to maintain a 3.00 grade point average or to make adequate progress toward completing a degree, as assessed by the student’s academic/research advisor, will be subject to suspension or dismissal from the Graduate School upon consultation with the major department. The final decision on suspension or dismissal will be made by the Dean of the Graduate School. See the Graduate School Rules for additional information.

Incomplete (I) Grades

  • An incomplete (I) grade is given only when students, for documented reasons, beyond their control, have been unable to complete course requirements in the semester enrolled.
    • A substantial amount of work must have been satisfactorily completed before approval of such a grade is given.
    • The final grade (earned by completing the course requirements or by retaking the course) does not result in the deletion of the (I) from the transcript.
    • A second entry is posted on the transcript to show the final grade for the course. At the end of one year, (I) grades for courses that are not completed or repeated are regarded as (F) and are shown as such on the student’s transcript.
    • Courses with grades of (I) are not included in the computation of grade point averages until a final letter grade has been awarded in that course.
  • Click here to learn more about Incomplete Grades.

Graduation Checklist

Check the Graduate School deadlines for details prior to the start of the semester.

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