The pre-proposal builds upon and expands the initial Statement of Intent. This document should:
- Describe the key construction-related problem the research will address
- Provide a review/synthesis/critical analysis of prior art related to the problem
- Clearly state the research question(s) and objectives and delimit the scope of work
- Describe the approach to be undertaken to answer the research question(s) and validate/test the findings
- Identify the expected impact of the work
- Provide a research execution plan identifying tasks, timeline, milestones, and required resources, and
- Provide a complete list of references cited and a separate Annotated Bibliography of the most important literature supporting the research.
The pre-proposal provides a formal introduction of the plan for the research to the advisory committee, and generally serves as a basis for the committee to identify relevant questions the student must answer for the Preliminary Exam.
Students should plan to schedule a meeting with their advisory committee to present the pre-proposal whenever it is complete, but no later than the third semester of residency in the Ph.D. program. Students should provide a hard copy of the pre-proposal to all committee members for review no later than two weeks prior to the committee meeting.
