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• The Personal Information, Academic Information, and Student Awards sections should be populated automatically from SFU databases.  Check those sections carefully for accuracy and completeness.
• In the Student Scholarly Achievements and Activities section you should indicate whether courses and other requirements (and the candidacy exam for PhD students) are complete, give a tentative thesis title and a synopsis of the research, summarize your progress, explain any significant obstacles you encountered to making progress, and note the date of your most recent superevisory committee meeting.
• Other parts of that section can be used like a CV and are optional.
• In the Plans for Program Completion section explain what progress you plan to make in the coming year.

Students are encouraged to hold supervisory committee meetings in a timely manner, and not delay scheduling the meetings until the month the GPR is due. Separate meetings with individual committee members can only be used in place of the committee meeting under exceptional circumtaces and with prior approval of the DGSC Chair.  Minutes of the committee meeting are not required for the GPR, but the details of past progress and future plans reported in the GPR should match the substance of the committee meeting.

MSc and MPM students are expected to discuss a research proposal with the supervisory committee at a committee no latere than the second semester enrolled.  A formal thesis proposal (3-4 pages single-spaced with 12 pt font), including Backgroun, Research Objectives and Methods sections (plus one or more pages of References) is required at the time of the first GPR (the fourth semester enrolled).

In your comments on your first GPR you should indicate whether you have submitted that thesis proposl.

Students who have just completed the first year of the MET program should submit a progress report that emphasizes all courses tken plus any preliminary research plans.

MET students are required to form a supervisory committee by the end of the 3rd semester enrolled.  After a committee has been formed, future annual progress reports will include updates on research progress and will follow the requirements for a progress report listed above in "What's in a Progress Report?"

PhD candidates must defend a 5-page thesis proposal during a candidacy exam.  The candidacy exam normally occurs in the fourth semester enrolled (or 2 semesters after transfer from MSc).  

Progress is considered satisfactory when two conditions are met:
 
1. Satisfactory CGPA - a minimum CGPA of 3.0 is required
 
2. Satisfactory evaluations by supervisory committee - Each member of the supervisory committee must report on student progress at least once each year. This is done by comments in the GPR which should address progress in:

• articulating the goals and broad context of the research
• understanding and applying relevant methods
• data collection, analysis and writing, and
• development of good work habits

Progress on courses, research and scholarships as well as overall progress are each rated by the senior supervisor (in consultation with other superviosry committee members) as very good, satisfactory, satisfactory with concerns, or unsatisfactory.  Comments by supervisory committee members that indicate unsatisfactory progress in any area will be discussed between the committee member(s) and the graduate program chair.  An unsatisfactory rating for overall progress by the Senior Supervisor will trigger a formal progress review by the DGSC.

Unsatisfactory progress, owing to the failure to meet either of the two requirements for satisfactory progress, will trigger a review by the Departmental Graduate Studies Committee (DGSC).

The DGSC, in consultation with the student’s supervisory committee, will inform the student of the unsatisfactory progress and may either require the student to improve in specific ways in a specific period of time or may require the student to withdraw.

These outcomes, and the appeal procedures, are described more fully in the Graduate General Regulations 1.8.2.
 
If you have concerns about your committee please complete the Confidential Report to DGSC Chair.