Prospective master’s degree students must apply online through the IU Indianapolis Graduate Office. The deadline for applications is February 1 (international applicants) and May 1 (domestic applicants). Both deadlines are for matriculation in August of the same year. Applications are forwarded to the chair of the graduate student admissions committee.
Required Materials
In addition to completing the online application, applicants to the MS program must submit official undergraduate and graduate transcripts to:
Department of Microbiology and Immunology
Attention: Chair, Graduate Admissions Committee
IU School of Medicine
635 Barnhill Drive, MS 420
Indianapolis, IN 46202
The Department of Microbiology and Immunology requires the application, TOEFL or IELTS scores (if applicable), three letters of recommendation, and undergraduate and graduate transcripts. The Graduate Record Exam (GRE) is not required.
Admission Requirements
Minimum admission requirements for the Master of Science degree include undergraduate courses in basic biology, including cell biology and genetics, general and organic chemistry, physics, and mathematics, including calculus. Biochemistry is recommended. Coursework deficiencies should be addressed during the first year of enrollment. Applicants must have an overall grade point average of at least 3.0 (B). For international students, an IELST score of 6.5/7 is required; TOEFL would be approximately 100. The master’s program does not allow for conditional acceptance of applicants. MS students are not financially supported by the department and must pay for their own courses and fees as well as living expenses.
Application Process
Applications are first reviewed by the graduate student admissions committee, which decides whether to proceed with the application process or to reject the applicant (typically for not meeting minimal standards for admission). The admissions committee chair informs the student of the preliminary decision.
Applicants approved to proceed identify one faculty member from the department with whom to take a laboratory rotation of four weeks. Upon successful completion of the rotation, the faculty member will take the student into the faculty laboratory and serve as that student’s mentor for their thesis research project. Students are responsible for contacting and securing an interview with a faculty mentor. The faculty member must complete and return a mentor selection form to the chair of the graduate student admission committee indicating that the applicant has been interviewed in person, online or by phone and that the faculty member is willing to consider the applicant for admission to their laboratory for research training within the MS program.
Mentor selection forms are available from the chair of the graduate student admissions committee. The interview and mentor selection form must be completed and returned to the admissions committee chair within six weeks of the applicant being notified to proceed with this step. If the interview and mentor selection forms are not completed and returned to the admissions committee chair within six weeks of the applicant’s notification to find a mentor, the application may be rejected with no further action taken on it.
The admissions committee chair sets up an additional interview for the applicant with a member of the admissions committee so that there is a minimum of two interviews for each student. At least one interview is conducted by a member of the admissions committee not seeking to mentor that student in the faculty’s own lab.
The admissions committee reviews the application and comments from the interviewers and votes on acceptance or rejection. The admissions committee chair brings the results of the committee’s decision to the full faculty for a vote, either in a departmental faculty meeting or by email.
If the departmental vote is negative with respect to acceptance, the applicant is notified by the admissions committee chair with a formal letter or email. If the departmental vote is positive, the application materials are forwarded to the IU School of Medicine Graduate Division for the final admission decision.
Applicants offered admission must have in place one laboratory in which they can do a rotation, and that faculty mentor must initially be willing to take that student on for MS thesis research. The potential faculty mentor must indicate willingness to mentor the MS student by signing and submitting the MS mentor selection form.