Online Master of Computer Science

2020
Summer - May 18, 2020 | Application Deadline: April 19, 2020
Fall A - August 20, 2020 | Application Deadline: July 23, 2020
Fall B - October 15, 2020 | Application Deadline: September 16, 2020

A minimum cumulative GPA of 3.00 (3.25 recommended) in the last 60 credit hours (last two years) of a four-year undergraduate degree. If your degree was completed in the U.S., it must be from a regionally accredited university.

Students who are applying who have previously completed graduate-level coursework must have a minimum post-baccalaureate/graduate GPA of 3.00.

Don't yet meet these admission requirements? Learn more about the pathway or a professional certification by clicking on the non-degree tab below.

Two (2) semesters of advanced math in Calculus I and Calculus II, and a background course in Discrete Math.

Students with an undergraduate degree in a STEM field have likely completed the math requirement. 

Demonstrated knowledge on official transcripts of the topics below.

CSE 230: Computer Organization and Assembly Language Programming

• Register-level computer organization. Instruction set architecture. Assembly language. Processor organization and design. Memory organization. IO programming. Exception/interrupt handling.

CSE 310: Data Structures and Algorithms

• Advanced data structures and algorithms, including stacks, queues, trees (B, B+, AVL), and graphs. Searching for graphs, hashing, external sorting.

CSE 330: Operating Systems

• Operating system structure and services, processor scheduling, concurrent processes, synchronization techniques, memory management, virtual memory, input/output, storage management, and file systems.

Principles of Programming Languages OR Introduction to Theoretical Computer Science

• CSE 340: Principles of Programming Languages — Formal syntactic and semantic descriptions, compilation and implementation issues, and theoretical foundations for several programming paradigms.

• CSE 355: Introduction to Theoretical Computer Science — Introduces formal language theory and automata, Turing machines, decidability/undecidability, recursive function theory, and complexity theory.

Are you a non-computer science undergrad?

If you don’t have these topics on your transcript but have a strong understanding of them, you can take the prerequisite knowledge exams. If you complete the exams with the grade outlined in the respective syllabi, you will satisfy that prerequisite knowledge requirement.

To access these exams and the accompanying refresher courses, click here.

To pursue the Pathway or a Professional Certification (also known as the Coursera MasterTrack™ Certificate), a student must submit a non-degree application.

To submit a non-degree application, follow these steps:

1. Submit your Computer Science Graduate Non-degree application here
   • Be sure to select "non-degree" in the upper left-hand corner when you start your application. Make sure you select "Master of Computer Science" in the non-degree application under "Plan".
   • Make sure you select "Master of Computer Science" in the non-degree application under "Plan". If you do not see this option, make sure you only start the application from the link above.
2. ASU Admissions will review the application and notify you by email if any additional steps are required or upon admission.
   • All official emails will go to your ASU student Gmail account.

Pathway

The Pathway offers you an opportunity to establish a high Graduate GPA in order to meet admission requirements.

Through the Pathway, you choose and complete any three 500-level (3) courses that are part of the MCS degree program as a non-degree student. If you complete all three courses with a 3.0 GPA on the first attempt within 18 months, you have demonstrated the ability to succeed in the subject matter and can apply to the degree program using this new GPA. The courses you complete in the pathway with a B or better will apply towards the MCS degree, once admitted.

Additionally, students who complete nine (9) graduate credits with a 3.0 or better, do not need to demonstrate English Proficiency. So if you successfully complete the Pathway, you will have satisfied the English Proficiency requirement.

Professional Certification

If you are not sure you want to pursue the full degree yet, or you only want to focus on a specific topic, you can pursue a Professional Certification for ASU credit (also known as a Coursera MasterTrack™ Certificate.)

To receive a Professional Certification, you must successfully complete three online MCS courses (9 credit hours) with a B or better on your first attempt.

Professional Certification in Big Data

CSE 511 Data Processing, CSE 572 Data Mining, CSE 575 Statistical Machine Learning, CSE 578 Data Visualization

Professional Certification in Software Engineering (coming soon)
Professional Certification in Artificial Intelligence (coming soon)
Professional Certification in Cybersecurity (coming soon)