Plan of Study:
I am a new student and need to complete a plan of study. Where can I find the form and what is the process:
You can get the ECE Plan of Study forms on the ECE website. You would choose the EE non-thesis and add your courses for the Robotics program. Be sure to list both course number and name of the course (you can abbreviate the name), term, credits and any grades that you have received thus far. Here is the link to the templates:
Electrical Engineering Plan of Study Templates –
Once the form is completed, contact the program coordinator for approval; after that, submit the form to the ECE Graduate Student Services Coordinator (Diana Poulalion @ ucf edu).
-My Bachelor’s degree is not in ECE, CS or MAE. I’m taking extra classes beyond the degree requirements in order to prepare for the engineering school. Is this sufficient or will I be required to take more engineering classes beyond this to get accepted into the program?
Robotics requires some background in field like Control and generally in programming. If you possess the background, no other courses are required beyond the program requirements. Note that all graduate courses have an option for “consent of instructor” which allows you to confirm with the instructor that your background is sufficient.
If you have not taken any control courses, you will need to do that. Any undergrad or 5000 level courses in Linear Control, or Introduction to Robotics will be helpful. You also need strong programming skills.
Scholarships and Funding:
I’ve been looking into various funding opportunities specifically assistantships. Can you provide any information about research assistantships beyond what is provided on the UCF website?
The link to ECE department scholarships is here: https://www.ece.ucf.edu/ece-scholarships/
The Robotics program at UCF offers scholarships that will be administered through the ECE scholarships programs. More information on that will be available later this summer.
In addition, individual faculty usually have Research or Teaching Assistantships. For that, you will need to contact the faculty whose field of work is of interest to you. You should prepare a CV/Resume, send that in an email and explain your availability for a GRA or GTA position.
-I have very strong interest in a research assistant position and would like to know essentially what it takes to be granted a role.
A good candidate will be someone that can contribute to the faculty’s on-going projects or research. For example, some UCF labs work on RoboRacer and Lunar Robotic subjects. We usually hire graduate students that are able to help with designing and programming the robots, work on the computer vision, decision making and path planning algorithms. This requires the GRA candidate to have some background in these fields, and have very strong programming skills. Knowledge of ROS 2.0 and NAV2 will be very helpful. Hands-on experience with building robotics platforms are highly desired as well.
Class schedules and taking classes online:
The program states that it is not possible to complete fully online. would I be able to complete the majority of the work online and specific labs in person?
All graduate courses that are required for the program offer an online section (except one). There is one course that currently does not offer an online section, but it has an alternative that you can take. So, the short answer is: Yes, you can find a path to do most of the courses online, but in “synchronous” online mode. This means that you will be required to participate in some sections remotely. Most classes have labs or other experiments that can be arranged to be done remotely.
– What specific classes are not offered online, and is it possible that they are offered later in the day so students could commute to UCF for these classes?
As mentioned above, currently only one course is not offered online (Machine Learning CAP 5610), which has an alternative from EEL 5825 with an online sections. So, technically all required courses are available online. Some of the other graduate courses are also either offered on Fridays or after hours, so you will have a chance to go to school on those days.