Overview of Graduate Courses

The University of Washington operates on a quarter system. Each quarter consists of approximately ten weeks of classes followed by one week of final exams. Autumn Quarter starts near the end of September, Winter Quarter starts just after New Year's Day, and Spring Quarter starts near the end of March. The academic year ends in early to mid June. There is also a Summer Quarter during which graduate students may take seminars and reading courses, but no formal graduate courses are offered in the summer.

Most graduate students take three courses per quarter. First-year Master's students typically begin with two courses at the combined Undergraduate/Graduate level and one entry-level graduate course, while first-year PhD students typically take three entry-level graduate courses.

A list of courses being offered during the current academic year can be found on the Courses Web page.

The courses available to graduate students can be divided into four categories:

Undergraduate/graduate courses

These courses are open to both undergraduate and graduate students.

The full-year courses in this first group count toward any Master's degree. MS students typically take two of the courses in this first group plus one entry-level graduate course during their first year. Occasionally, PhD students take one of these as well.

The courses in this second group are two or three quarters long, and count only toward the MA degree.

Entry level graduate courses

These full-year courses are offered every year.

CORE GRADUATE COURSES (PhD students must satisfactorily complete at least three of these):

OTHER ENTRY LEVEL COURSES

Intermediate graduate courses

These courses generally require one or more entry-level courses as prerequisites.

OFFERED EVERY YEAR:

OFFERED APPROXIMATELY EVERY OTHER YEAR:

Special topics courses

Approximately five special topics courses are offered every quarter, depending on current faculty and student interests. Here are some representative topics courses that have been offered in recent years:

  • Abelian Varieties
  • Advanced Methods in Combinatorics
  • Algebraic Combinatorics
  • Algebraic K-Theory
  • Algebraic Number Theory
  • Analysis on SL(2,R)
  • Applications of Partial Differential Equations to Differential Geometry
  • Approximation Theory
  • Approximations and Fast Computations on Spheres and Euclidean Spaces
  • Calabi-Yau Manifolds
  • Characteristic Classes and Cobordism
  • Classical Mechanics
  • Classifying Spaces and Group Cohomology
  • Coding Theory
  • Cohomology of Groups
  • Combinatorial Geometry of Arrangements and Configurations
  • Combinatorial Optimization
  • Complex Analytic Dynamics
  • Configurations of Points and Lines
  • Conformally Invariant Stochastic Processes
  • Cryptography and Error-Correcting Codes
  • Descriptions and Models of Students' Understanding of Mathematics
  • Differential Forms on the Classical Groups
  • Diffusion Processes
  • Discrete State Markov Processes and Interacting Particle Systems
  • Elliptic Curves and Selmer Groups
  • Ergodic Theory
  • Extremal and Probabilistic Combinatorics
  • Fibrations and Spectral Sequences
  • Financial Mathematics
  • Finite Element Methods
  • Formal Groups
  • Forward-Backward Stochastic Differential Equations
  • Foundations of Combinatorics
  • General Theory of Polyhedra
  • Geometric Function Theory
  • Geometric Measure Theory
  • Geometry of Numbers
  • Geometry of Polytopes
  • Graph Theory
  • Groebner Bases
  • Group Cohomology
  • Homological Algebra
  • Homological Algebraic Methods in Commutative Algebra and Algebraic Geometry
  • Hyperbolic Conservation Laws and Computational Fluid Dynamics
  • Integral Geometry
  • Interior Point Methods for Optimization
  • Introduction to Class Field Theory
  • Introduction to Computational Number Theory
  • Introduction to Iwasawa Theory
  • Introduction to L-functions
  • Introduction to Metric Geometry
  • Introduction to Microlocal Analysis
  • Introduction to Several Complex Variables and Almost-Complex Geometry
  • Inverse Problems
  • Inverse Problems and Carleman Estimates
  • Iterative Methods for Solving Linear Systems
  • Knot Invariants
  • Large Deviations
  • Malliavin Calculus
  • Mathematical Logic and the Foundations of Mathematics
  • Modern Set Theory
  • Modular Forms and Elliptic Curves
  • Morse Theory
  • New Ideas for Teaching Calculus
  • Noncommutative Algebra and Geometry
  • Numerical Methods for Inverse Problems and Tomography
  • Oriented Matroids
  • Polygons, Tilings and Polyhedra
  • Polyhedra, Tesselations, and Maps
  • Problems in Discrete Geometry
  • Pseudo-holomorphic Curves in Almost Complex Manifolds
  • Quantum Fields and Strings
  • Quantum Mechanics
  • Quantum Probability
  • Random Graphs
  • Representations of Finite and Compact Groups
  • Representations of the Orthogonal Group
  • Riemann Surfaces
  • Riemann's Zeta Function
  • Scattering Theory
  • Shifts of Finite Type, Introduction and Recent Progress
  • Spectral Sequences
  • Stochastic Analysis and its Applications
  • Stochastic Programming Approach to Finance
  • Teacher Thinking and Student Thinking in Mathematics
  • Toeplitz Operators
  • Topology of Smooth Manifolds
  • Tomography, Impedance Imaging, and Integral Geometry
  • Unsolved Problems in Combinatorics and Discrete Geometry
  • Variational Analysis
  • Wavelets
  • Young Tableaux in Representation Theory and Geometry