The Engineer degree represents one to two additional years of study beyond the Master’s degree and includes a research thesis. The program is designed for students who wish to do professional engineering work upon graduation and who want to engage in more specialized study than is afforded solely by a Master’s degree. It is expected that full-time students will be able to complete the degree within two years of study after the Master’s degree.

Residency & Program Requirements

A student with an MS in Civil Engineering may satisfy the Engineer in Civil and Environmental Engineering degree requirements by completing an additional 45 unduplicated coursework and research units for a total of minimum 90 quarter units of full-time graduate study (or equivalent part-time graduate study). For most students, the Master’s degree supplies 45 of these units. For external applicants, if your master’s degree was obtained at another school, you can apply to transfer up to 45 quarter units of residency credit by completing an Application for Graduate Residency Credit for Graduate Work Done Elsewhere. No units need to be transferred if you hold an MS degree from Stanford. Note that 45 units refers to units in a quarter system; you will need to convert semester units into quarter units if your previous Master’s degree is from a school on the semester system. Guidelines are given on the form.

The 45 post-MS units for an Engineer Degree in Civil & Environmental Engineering must meet the following requirements:

All 45 units must be 100+ level, and at least 23 units must be 200+ level.
No more than 6 out of these 45 units may be taken on a CR/NC basis. However, there is no limit on S/NC units.
No PE or MUSIC units may be counted as part of these 45 units.
All 45 units must be approved by your advisor as being relevant to your ENG studies.
At least 24 of the 45 post-MS units must consist of lecture- or laboratory-style classes. [Note: Your program or advisor may require more than this 24-unit minimum.] To qualify as lecture- or laboratory-style, these 24 units must meet the following constraints:
- No independent study (INS), activity (ACT), or research (RES, RSC) classes may count. (Class type for each course is given in the Schedule pulldown on Stanford Navigate Classes)
- No seminar-style classes may count. These are often (but not always) listed under the class type SEM or COL; the course title or description may feature words like seminar or colloquium. The CEE department defines a class as seminar-style if >50% of the class meeting time is devoted to guest speakers and/or student presentations. ENGR103 is the only exception.
- 1-unit courses may count towards these 24 units only if they are CME workshops (WKS). No other 1-unit courses may count.
- No EFSLANG courses may count.
The other up to 21 units in this category may include:
- INS, ACT, RES and RSC classes, and thesis units (e.g., CEE299, 300, 365A, 370A, 381).
- Seminar-style classes and 1-unit courses.
- EFSLANG courses, if required or strongly recommended on the English assessment form.
Your thesis research must be supervised by a Stanford faculty member and normally should begin during the first quarter of study after the Master’s degree.
Your advisor and the Department Chair must approve your program of study by signing the completed Application for Candidacy for the Degree of Engineer form.

Engineer candidates must submit an acceptable thesis (12-15 units) and maintain a minimum GPA of 3.0. A faculty member in the department must approve the program of study.

The thesis typically should be started in the first quarter of graduate study e.For students who may wish to continue studying toward a CEE PhD, the Engineer thesis topic must be significantly different from their doctoral thesis topic.

Graduate students who lack an adequate background in their area of specialization (e.g., lack a prior degree in civil engineering, if required in their program) or who are not full-time students should expect to be enrolled for more than two years post-B.S. Engineer degree candidates should develop individually tailored expected-progress timetables in consultation with their program advisor.

In addition to the general Engineer Degree requirements, Engineer degree students are required to pick a subplan and fulfill the specific requirements of that subplan as detailed below.

CEE-ENG - Civil and Environmental Engineering (ENG)

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Learning Outcomes

External Credit Policies

Advising Expectations