The department of industrial, systems and manufacturing engineering offers a dual/accelerated bachelor’s to master’s degree program to undergraduate students in both the industrial engineering and product design and manufacturing engineering programs, culminating in the Master of Science in engineering.

The accelerated program offers outstanding students the opportunity to pursue both the bachelor’s and master’s degrees in a parallel and coordinated program. Students in the program are guided by the graduate coordinator and the departmental graduate committee until the BS degree is complete. Once the undergraduate degree is complete, an adviser in the area of the student’s interest is identified.

Admission

To be considered for admission to the program, the student must:

• Have a minimum WSU GPA of 3.250, and
• Be within 40 credit hours of completing the requirements for a bachelor’s degree.

Undergraduate students apply for bachelor’s to master’s programs using the regular Graduate School application form and admission process (including paying the Graduate School application fee).

Students should apply for graduate admission at least one semester before the semester in which they plan to obtain credit at both the undergraduate and graduate level. Should the student meet the admission requirements set for the program, tentative admission is granted, pending the award of the bachelor’s degree.

Tentative graduate admission does not guarantee final admission to the graduate program. Final graduate admission is contingent upon the student meeting all the admission requirements in place for the graduate program at the time the bachelor’s degree is awarded. If a tentatively admitted student does not achieve final admission, the graduate work already completed is moved to the undergraduate transcript. 

Program Guidelines

• The maximum number of credit hours that can be used for both undergraduate and graduate program credit (joint degree courses) is limited to 9 credit hours.
• Only courses 700 level and above can be used for joint credit. Courses that are prerequisites for the graduate program, core courses in the undergraduate curriculum, workshop or cooperative education courses are also excluded.
• Until the bachelor’s degree is awarded, for each semester in which the student takes courses at both the graduate and undergraduate level, a Dual/Accelerated Enrollment Form must be completed indicating the courses taken for graduate credit (as well as joint credit).
• The bachelor’s degree may be awarded at any time following the completion of the undergraduate degree requirements and completion of the joint degree hours.
• The bachelor’s degree must be awarded at least two semesters before the graduate degree is awarded.
• Graduate program coursework must be completed within eight years (from the time the first graduate course counted toward degree requirements is taken) or within six years from the awarding of the bachelor’s degree, whichever comes first.
• The supervisory committee should be listed on each dual enrollment form, and a program of study filed as soon as the student has received their bachelor’s degree.
• A tentative outline for degree completion should be developed by the student and advisor and kept in the student’s departmental file. The outline for degree completion projects courses to be taken each semester and the semester in which the bachelor’s degree and master’s degree would be awarded.
• In addition, annual reviews of student progress are conducted with a written progress report placed in the student’s departmental file by the departmental graduate committee.
• Students in a dual/accelerated degree program may not hold a graduate assistantship until after the bachelor’s degree is awarded, and the student is fully admitted to the graduate program.
• For the purpose of requesting exceptions to program and university regulations, students in a dual/accelerated degree program are considered undergraduates and thus proceed through the undergraduate processes until the bachelor’s degree is awarded.
• Students admitted to the dual/accelerated degree program, who do not complete the program or who request admission to any other WSU program, forfeit the joint hours in the program. The joint hours will be posted only to the undergraduate transcript. If joint hours are already posted to both the graduate and undergraduate transcript, the hours on the graduate transcript will be removed.