Welcome and thank you for your interest in applying to one of our graduate programs. Admission to the graduate program is determined by the faculty of the Aerospace Engineering Department through its Graduate Program Committee, with the Rackham Graduate School acting as the administrative body overseeing the admissions process.

The Department of Aerospace Engineering offers broadly based programs of study leading to the following graduate degrees in Aerospace Engineering:

• Master of Science in Engineering (MSE)
• Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

The Department also offers the opportunity for Sequential Graduate/Undergraduate Study (SGUS) for top students in the undergraduate program. This leads to the MSE degree. Click here to find out more about SGUS.

Teaching activities in the Department are organized into three main areas:

• Gas dynamics
• Structural mechanics
• Flight dynamics and control systems
  

A good deal of research in the department is multidisciplinary; students doing multidisciplinary work take courses from more than one of the areas. Prospective students should outline their research interests in their applications.

Deadline Information

Fall admission deadlines are December 15 for the PhD program and January 15 for the SGUS and MSE programs.

Winter admission deadlines are November 1 for the PhD, SGUS and MSE programs.

All application materials should arrive by these dates to be considered for admission. Applications that arrive after the deadline, or remain incomplete beyond the deadline, will be at a competitive disadvantage during the evaluation process.

Application Requirements

The items needed in order for your application to be considered complete are:

• A completed on-line application form.
• One set of official transcripts from ALL schools where bachelor's, master's, or professional degrees were awarded. The College of Engineering generally looks for applicants who have demonstrated academic effort through a minimum GPA of 3.2 on a 4.0 scale.
• Graduate Record Examination (GRE) General test scores (code: 1839). The College of Engineering generally looks for applicants who attain a minimum of (1) a combined Verbal and Quantitative score of 1200, and (2) an Analytical Writing score of 4.0. 
• Three letters of recommendations with the official Rackham Recommendation Form cover sheet from people who are familiar with you, in particular faculty members who have supervised your coursework and/or research.
• Academic statement of purpose, describing your graduate study objectives.
• Personal statement for any additional information or extenuating circumstances.
• Curriculum Vitae (CV).
• Official TOEFL (code: 1839) scores (only for international applicants or non-native speakers of English). The iBT TOEFL minimum requirement is 84. For more information on score requirements, view the Rackham website.

To begin completing an application, go here.

You might be eligible for a waived application fee!

How to Apply

These materials need to be sent directly to Rackham:

• A completed on-line application form, including the academic statement, personal statement, and CV (no hard copies need to be submitted)
• Official test scores (i.e., GRE, TOEFL) (institution code: 1839)
• All official transcripts (no copies) need to be mailed to:
  Rackham Graduate School
  Attn: Transcripts/U-M ID# (if known) or Date of Birth (mm/dd/yyyy)
  915 E Washington Street
  Ann Arbor MI 48109-1070
  USA

Letters of recommendations should be submitted electronic by your recommenders. If your recommenders cannot provide the recommendation in that way, they will need to send hard copies of their letters of recommendations to:

Christy Byks-Jazayeri
Admissions Coordinator and Assistant to Graduate Coordinator
Aerospace Engineering
University of Michigan
2053 Francois-Xavier Bagnoud Building
1320 Beal Avenue
Ann Arbor, MI 48109-2140
U.S.A.

For Foreign Applicants

• Please do not submit any financial information at this time. Providing Evidence of Financial Support (non-U.S. students only) can be found on the Rackham Graduate School website.
• An applicant with a degree from an institution where the language of instruction is not English is required to provide official score reports from either the TOEFL, the MELAB, or the IELTS.
• Applicants who have earned or will earn a Bachelor or Master degree from an institution where the language of instruction is English, exclusively, are exempt from submitting an Official English Proficiency Score. Official verification from the school must be submitted in the form of a statement about the usages of English in its teaching and overall program.
• Please visit Submitting Transcripts and Other Supporting Documents with Your Online Application on Rackham's Web site for detailed information about submitting transcripts and diplomas.

Program and Test Codes for the Application

• Aerospace Engineering PhD - Program Code 00043
• Aerospace Engineering MSE - Program Code: 00044
• Aerospace Engineering SGUS - Program Code 01550
• Institution code (for GRE and TOEFL): 1839

Recommendations

In general, our Admissions Committee is most interested in undergraduate and graduate academic performance, GRE scores, research experience, letters of recommendation (particularly coming from faculty), and the academic statement of purpose.

If you are applying to the Ph.D. program, we recommend that you contact faculty whose research is of interest to you. In addition to the quality of your application, our Admissions Committee takes into account the abilities of our faculty to mentor additional students in their labs, and a PhD applicant will not be admitted if there is no match of interest with faculty member(s).

An engineering background is highly recommended. We have found that the lack of an engineering background puts students at a disadvantage during their graduate studies. We request applicants who lack an engineering background to take the Fundamentals of Engineering (FE) exam administered by the National Council of Examiners for Engineering and Surveying (NCEES), besides the already required GREs (find out more information). If admitted to the program, we advise those students to also take upper level Aerospace Engineering undergraduate courses to lay the foundation for the graduate courses. The set of undergraduate courses is decided on a case-by-case basis and worked among the student, the Ph.D. adviser (if applicable), and the Graduate Committee.

Correspondence and Information

If you have questions about your application, or about Aerospace Engineering at U-M in general, please contact:

Christy Byks-Jazayeri
Admissions Coordinator and Assistant to Graduate Coordinator
Aerospace Engineering
University of Michigan
2053 Francois-Xavier Bagnoud Building
1320 Beal Avenue
Ann Arbor, MI 48109-2140
Phone: (734) 764-3311

You can also visit the Prospective Students Seeking Degree Status on Rackham's Web site.

Additional information on the admissions process, and an online admission application, are available at the College of Engineering Admissions site. Additional information on criteria for admissions and degree programs is available on the Rackham Admissions site.