About DSP

• Introduction
• Program
• Eligibility for DSP 2017
• Financial Support

Introduction

　The Data Sciences Program (DSP) started on October 2015 as one of the “International Priority Graduate Programs (PGP) - Advanced Graduate Courses for International Students - ” supported by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, and Technology (MEXT).
　Main purpose of this program is to develop highly-specialized global human resource of data sciences contributing to construction of social, life, and environmental foundations. The program is designed to acquire not only basic knowledge and skills of data sciences based on computer sciences, fundamental mathematics, and engineering, but also practical skills for discovery and solving the real world problems in life sciences, social sciences, economics, and others. Graduate School of Information Sciences (GSIS) conducts this program in collaboration with graduate schools of Life Sciences, Economics and Management, and Engineering in Tohoku University. The courses will mainly be given in English except for some optional subjects to learn Japanese language and culture.

Program

　DSP consists of a graduate program combining 2-year master's and 3-year doctor's courses. Students should be affiliated with one of the four graduate schools: Graduate Schools of Information Sciences (GSIS), Life Sciences, Economics and Management, and Engineering. Primary and sub mentors are assigned to every student participating DSP for supervising their learning and research, where the primary mentor is the professor/associate professor accepting the student in her/his affiliated department of the graduate school, and the sub mentor belongs to GSIS. The course curriculum is organized as follows:

Master's course

(1) Lectures

i. Specialized subjects provided by the affiliated graduate school.

ii. Fundamental subjects to learn information law and ethics for the treatment of big data.

iii. Interdisciplinary subjects designated to data sciences: sensing, storage, computation/ analysis, data mining/ discovery and solving the real world problems

(2) Practical training and internship

i. Training Camp to develop computational ability of big data

ii. Internship in industries

(3) Writing a master thesis supervised by the mentors

Doctor's course

(1) Advanced seminars: Data science-related meetings, symposia, and conferences assigned by DSP

(2) Big data challenge: Project-based learning based on knowledge and skills of data science

(3) Writing doctor thesis supervised by the mentors

Eligibility for DSP 2017

♦ Applicants must be an excellent student newly coming from abroad to study as a graduate-level foreign student.
♦ Applicants must have earned over 2.3 evaluation point average of their latest two-year’s academic grade based on the specialized calculation (see note [1]).
♦ Applicant must be able to leave for and arrive in Japan by the beginning of October, 2017.
♦ Applicants for DSP need to satisfy ONE of the following conditions:

For 5 years Master's and Doctor's Courses Applicants
i) Those who have graduated, or will graduate, from a university, that is, completion of a total of 16 years of school education by September 30, 2017 (see note [2]).
ii) Those who have reached 22 years of age by September 30, 2017 and can be recognized to have an academic ability equivalent or superior to those who have graduated from a university based on individual qualification examinations.

For 3 years Doctor's Course Applicants
i) Those who have earned, or will earn, master's degree by September 30, 2017.
ii) Those who have engaged in research activities for at least 2 years at an educational or research institution after graduation from a university and can be recognized to have an academic ability equivalent or superior to those who have earned master’s degree on the basis of their research performance.
iii) Those who have reached 24 years of age by September 30, 2017 and can be recognized to have scholastic ability equivalent or superior to those who have earned master’s degree based on individual qualification examinations.

Notes:
[1] The calculation procedure of the evaluate point average

Scale	Grade
4-scale evaluation	A		B	C	D
	100-80		79-70	69-60	59-
5-scale evaluation	S	A	B	C	D
	A	B	C	D	F
	100-90	89-80	79-70	69-60	59-
Evaluation Point	3	3	2	1	0
Number of your total credit	N4	N3	N2	N1	N0

Evaluation Point=((N4+N3)×3+N2×2+N1×1)/(N4+N3+N2+N1+N0)

[2] The term “graduated from a university” means a total of 16 years of educational programs, which consists of 12 years of school education and a 4 years undergraduate (bachelor) program. 　 　　

Financial Support

Japanese government (MEXT) scholarship will be available for excellent students who intend to be actively engage in the DSP program and contribute to its objectives. A monthly stipend is available; details of this and other information are listed below. Awardees of the scholarship will be selected from the candidates who are successful in the DSP examination process. The MEXT scholarship scheme applies only to those who live outside of Japan at the time of application and were born on or after April 2, 1982.

(a) Exemption from Application, Admission and Tuition fees
(b) Monthly stipend: 146,000 JPY for a master's course student and 147,000 JPY for a doctor's course student
(c) Flight tickets between the applicant's country of nationality and Japan

# Self-supporting international students are highly encouraged to participate in DSP.

For master's and Doctor's courses: 5 years
Number of Recipient: 7 students
Term of the Scholarship: total 5 years (2 years for the master + 3 years for the doctor). If a student fails to maintain a certain evaluation point average during the master's course, the Ministry may cancel the 3-year doctor's scholarship.

For doctor's: 3 years
Number of Recipient: 3 students
Term of the Scholarship: 3 years