The application procedure consists of several steps. Please follow the procedure carefully. Candidates who wish to apply for a doctoral position are requested to follow this procedure.
Important dates:
July 6th, 2018 deadline for Infostud registration, application submission, and fee payment. (details on step 1 - here below)
July 6th, 2018 deadline for submission of documents specified in step 2 here below.
STEP 1
Apply to the university central office by following the application procedure specified in the call for applicants available in Italian and English (ART. 3 – APPLICATIONS). Please note: application deadline is July 6th, 2018. In particular, fill and confirm on-line the application form at website: www.uniroma1.it/studenti/infostud.
Don't forget to pay the registration tax. Information on the steps to follow can be found here.
DON’T WAIT UNTIL THE LAST MINUTE TO PERFORM THESE FORMAL STEPS. If you perform the needed steps some days in advance you can have our support in case of problems and you can check with the support of the PhD coordinator that all steps have been performed successfully and your application will not be rejected by central offices do to some formal mistakes. In addition to the list of documents to be sent to the evaluation committee (step 2 below) don’t forget to send to central offices requested documents highlighted in the call for applicants.
STEP 2
- ID: A photocopy of the applicant’s identity card or passport.
- MS-CERT: Certificate (or "autocertificazione" according to L. 183/2011 and DPR 445/200 in case of Italian degree) of master or other academic degree of at least 4 years attended with the final grades obtained. For foreign students, academic curriculum certificate with the declaration of validity (“dichiarazione di valore”) of the foreign degree issued by the competent Italian diplomatic representative in the Country where the academic qualification has been achieved. (We are aware that the bureaucratic process of getting the "dichiarazione di valore" can be long and that the document may not be available before July 31st. In case, just add a statement in your application that you will send the document as soon as you get it from the Italian Embassy or Consulate).
- TRANSCR: Academic transcripts (detailed exams, grades, completion dates, graduation date and score).
- CV: Curriculum vitae.
- STAT-P: Statement of Purpose.
- MSTh-SUM: A summary (at most 2 pages) of the candidate's MS Thesis.
- PUB: List and copies of scientific publications, if any.
- At most two letters of recommendation supporting the candidate. (to be sent separately by the reviewers by email to phdinfo@di.uniroma1.it)
- HON: Any other honors, awards, or qualifications, appropriately certified.
- GRE: If available, Graduate Record Examinations scores (GRE Computer Science subject test) or Personal Potential Index scores. Note that our department is a GRE Designated Institution (DI). In particular, DI Code 8299 is assigned to Sapienza University Rome - Dipartimento Informatica. Please use this code number when indicating our institution as GRE score report recipient.
Submit the required documents written in English or in Italian in a single mail to the coordinator of PhD studies, email address: phdinfo@di.uniroma1.it, (email subject: “First name and last name; Admission PhD 2018-19”)
Deadlines for applying
Items 1-10 can be sent by email to phdinfo@di.uniroma1.it (transcripts can be scanned). This information (Items 1-10) must reach us by July 6th, 2018 and be written in English or Italian. The maximum email size (text + documents) is 10MB (Megabytes). Larger email will be automatically discarded.
Recommendation letters must be sent by the recommenders by email to phdinfo@di.uniroma1.it specifying as subject: “Letter for [Applicant’s Name]”. Letters should be written on formal departmental paper clearly indicating the affiliation and the contact information of the writer. Letters written along different standards are not considered.
Coordinator's mail address:
Prof. Alessandro Mei
Dipartimento di Informatica, Sapienza Università di Roma
Via Salaria 113 (terzo piano, stanza 314a)
I-00169 Roma, Italy
According to art. 2 of the Call, applications are also accepted from students who expect to complete their degree by October 31st, 2018. They need to present, along with their application, a statement by their thesis supervisor declaring that he/she will complete his/her degree by the aforementioned date. This declaration replaces attachment 2 of the list above.
Selection Procedure, general rules
Requirements
A mandatory admission requirement is to have a Master's degree by October 31st, 2018. The degree must be issued by an institution recognized as having degree granting authority and must be officially translated in Italian or English.
Selection process
Admission decisions are made by a faculty Selection Committee. The selection procedure includes two phases:
-evaluation of qualifications (academic titles, statement of purpose, reference letters);
-interview.
In the first phase a ranking of applicants is made based on a composite of information which include academic performance, letters from referees, relevant professional activities, statement of purpose, correspondence between research interests and available faculty (research areas in the department at http://www.di.uniroma1.it/en/research).
Each applicant will receive a score between 0 and 60 (published online at http://phd.di.uniroma1.it/apply.php). Only applicants with a score of at least 40/60 successfully pass the first phase, short-listed, admitted to the second phase and invited for an interview.
The short-list is announced at web site: phd.di.uniroma1.it.
Notification is considered as delivered through the announcement of the list. The successful applicants will receive no personal communications of their results.
The interview, in Italian or English, is aimed to assess candidates background, skills, and potential to carry on research in the scientific areas of the PhD Programme. During the interview, the Selection Committee:
- will ask to discuss the statement of purpose and the personal motivations for applying to the PhD Programme;
- will verify the background in computer science;
- will test problem solving abilities of the candidate;
- will conduct an in-depth discussion of the qualifications of the candidate.
The interviews will take place on September 14th, 2018, 09:00 AM, Seminar Room, Via Salaria 113, third floor.
The Selection Committee assigns a score for the second phase of up to 60 points. A score of at least 40 is required for admission.
Only applicants with a total score of at least 80/120 can be admitted to the CS graduate program.
The final rankings will be published on September 18th, 2018 ONLY on this web site (phd.di.uniroma1.it).
For more information, contact the Programme coordinator, Prof. Alessandro Mei: alessandro.mei@uniroma1.it
Details on the evaluation procedure are provided below.
EVALUATION CRITERIA
Scoring of each applicant is made by assigning points on the following basis:
- CV (at most 30): Final mark in the Master degree (at most 6 points).
- For applicants defending their MS thesis after the deadline of the call, the evaluation of the final mark is replaced by an evaluation of the expected final mark based on the academic record (at most 6 points).
- Publications (at most 3 points)
3 Points = At least a publication on the Conference Proceedings of a Conference included among Class 1 conferences in the Italian CS conference rankings. Or, at least a publication on a journal indexed in ISI/SCOPUS in the List of top journals provided below at the end of this page.
2 Points = At least a publication on the Conference Proceedings of a Conference included among Class 2 conferences in the Italian CS conference rankings.
1 Point = At least a publication indexed in ISI/SCOPUS not included in the previous cases.
- Academic record (e.g. transcripts, awards, professional and research activities) (at most 21 points): Evaluation is based on the following elements:
1. Academic transcripts;
2. Research experience in prestigious international research or academic institutions;
3. Awards and prizes for activities compatible with the CS graduate program;
4. Participation to advanced training on topics related with the CS graduate program;
5. Recommendation letters.
- Statement of Purpose (max 2 pages, at most 20 points):
Each applicant submits a statement of purpose. This document should contain a description the reasons why you are interested in the PhD program at Sapienza, what are your career plans, your motivation, and your research interests. You may indicate faculty members that can potentially be your mentors and you should provide clear evidence of your familiarity and interest in their research activities or those carried out in the CS department.
- Resume of your MS Thesis (max 2 pages, at most 10 points):
This document should describe the work done during your MS thesis starting off with the state of the art of the area and laying out the goals, the research methodology, and the results.
Only applicants with a mark of at least 40/60 successfully pass to the interview.
EVALUATION CRITERIA FOR THE INTERVIEW
In the second phase, each admitted applicant is interviewed by the CS PhD Selection Committee. The interview will cover topics related with applicant’s CV, statement of purpose, Master thesis summary, as well as basic knowledge of CS topics. On the basis of their performance in the interview, applicants will receive a score between 0 and 60. Only applicants with a mark of at least 40/60 successfully pass also the second phase.
List of class 1 conferences
To see the top conferences, go to http://valutazione.unibas.it/gii-grin-scie-rating and search with class 1.
List of class 2 conferences
To see the second tier of conferences, go to http://valutazione.unibas.it/gii-grin-scie-rating/ and search with class 2.
List of top journals
This list has been identified by faculty based on journals consistently at the top of the ranking (SNIP and SJR metrics) according to the criteria used to evaluate research products in the last Italian research evaluation exercises. The list includes all IEEE and ACM Transactions and the following journals:
Ad Hoc Networks
Applied Soft Computing
Artificial Intelligence
Autonomous Agents And Multi-Agent Systems
Autonomous Robots
Bioinformatics
Computational Linguistics
Computer Networks
Computer Vision And Image Understanding
Computer-Aided Design
Constraints
Data Mining And Knowledge Discovery
Decision Support Systems
Empirical Software Engineering
Future Generation Computer Systems
Fuzzy Optimization And Decision Making
Fuzzy Sets And Systems
Information And Software Technology
Information Fusion
Information Sciences
Information Systems
Information Systems Journal
International Journal Of Approximate Reasoning
International Journal Of Computer Vision
International Journal Of Robotics Research
Journal Of Combinatorial Theory, Series B
Journal Of Computer And System Sciences
Journal Of Cryptology
Journal Of Machine Learning Research
Journal Of Mathematical Imaging And Vision
Journal Of The ACM
Journal Of Web Semantics
Knowledge And Information Systems
Knowledge-Based Systems
Library And Information Science Research
Machine Learning
Pattern Recognition
Requirements Engineering
Robotics And Computer-Integrated Manufacturing
Siam Journal On Computing
Siam Journal On Optimization
Swarm Intelligence
The Journal Of Artificial Intelligence Research
The Vldb Journal
User Modeling And User-Adapted Interaction