The Concurrent 5-Year Bachelor's/Master's Degree Program
Updated September 27, 2009
The Mechanical Engineering department offers a concurrent five-year Bachelor’s/Master’s program for Mechanical Engineering and Engineering Mechanics majors.
WHY EARN A MASTER'S DEGREE IN FIVE YEARS?
This is an excellent program for individuals who would like to earn their Master's Degree quickly. The degree will generally increase a student's chances for higher quality employment than would a Bachelor's Degree.
ELIGIBILITY and APPLICATION PROCESS
Please note that this program is available only to undergraduates in the Mechanical Engineering or Engineering Mechanics majors of the Johns Hopkins University.
The application must be submitted during the student's junior year. There are two deadlines to submit applications to the BS/MSE program:
- January 5 - admissions decisions are made by January 20
- June 15 - admissions decisions are made by June 30.
This will allow admitted students to schedule graduate courses immediately in the Spring or Fall semesters, without having to wait an extra semester to begin.
To apply for admission, the student must submit a college transcript and a formal graduate application, which is available at the links below. In addition, the student will need to present a statement of purpose that describes their career plans and rationale for advanced study at JHU.
Three letters of recommendation are required for the application; two of the letters should be from Mechanical Engineering faculty. GRE scores are not required.
These items can be delivered to the administrative office in Latrobe 223. Only when all items, including recommendation letters, are received will your application be considered. Upon acceptance into the program, students will be asked to develop an outline of their proposed academic program with their advisor.
REQUIREMENTS
The requirements for a Master of Science in Engineering - Mechanical Engineering are as follows:
Satisfactory completion of eight one-semester advanced courses approved by your advisor:
- No more than two courses may be chosen from the Part-Time Programs.
- No more than four courses may be at the intermediate/advanced undergraduate (xxx.300 – xxx.499) level.
- At least two courses should be in applied mathematics, numerical analysis, or computational methods. (This requirement can be waived in writing by your advisor, if sufficient prior preparation in these areas can be demonstrated).
- These courses cannot include Independent Study, MSE Graduate Research, Graduate Research, or Special Studies.
- Note: A course is satisfactorily completed if a grade of A, B, C, or P is obtained. No more than one C grade can be counted toward the requirements and a D or F or second C grade will result in the student being placed on probation. A second D or F or a third C grade results in termination from the program.
Plus either:
- Two additional one-semester graduate courses (xxx.600–xxx.799) approved by your advisor (for BS/MSE and MSE students only, one can be 530.600 MSE Graduate Student Research), or...
- ...an M.S.E. Thesis acceptable to your advisor and one other reader. According to the Graduate Board’s Procedures for Administration of Approved Policies for the Award of Advanced Degrees, “Thesis readers are selected and appointed by the chair or appropriate faculty of the sponsoring department or committee. Any duly appointed member of a department or committee holding the rank of assistant professor or higher (excluding lecturers) is eligible for selection as a referee without prior approval. The Graduate Board Office must approve readers from outside the University, or from any non-Ph.D. sponsoring department, laboratory or institute within the University.”
DOUBLE-COUNTING of COURSES
The Mechanical Engineering department double-counts courses using the policy set by the Whiting School of Engineering:
Coursework applied to a bachelor's degree:
Students either in a WSE concurrent (bachelor's/master's) program or seeking a WSE master's degree after having earned a WSE or Krieger School of Arts and Sciences bachelor's degree may double-count two courses (400-level or higher) to both programs with the permission of the master's faculty advisor. WSE master's degree candidates may not double-count courses applied to a bachelor's degree earned at a different institution. Individual graduate programs reserve the right to enforce stricter policies.
Coursework not applied to a bachelor's degree:
For students who are either in a WSE concurrent bachelor's/master's degree program or have already earned a Whiting School of Engineering or Krieger School of Arts and Sciences bachelor's degree and are seeking a WSE master's degree, any graduate-level coursework (as defined by the WSE graduate program) not applied to the undergraduate degree may be applied to the graduate degree, regardless of when that course was taken (i.e., before or after the undergraduate degree has been conferred) with the permission of the master's faculty advisor.
APPLICATION and CURRICULUM
- Click here for a sample curriculum shell of a five-year program.
- Click here to download an application.
- Click here to download a letter of recommendation cover sheet.
Please contact your advisor if you have questions about the program.



