Advancement to Candidacy!
Yay! I passed!!! 
I guess that’s the most important part…
I consulted with a few people that had just advanced for advice of what to expect on the “big day.” A couple of them were still freaked out, but I got the actual low-down from one girl. She told me that they ask you to leave the room before you even get started. They talk about your paper and how you’ve already passed. Then they let you back in, and you give your presentation. I don’t know if they are supposed to interrupt or let you talk and then ask questions, but I wasn’t going to care either way. As it turned out, they did stop along the way and ask MANY questions; they also gave me a LOT of good suggestions. I still have to write a small addendum by the beginning of December, but hopefully that won’t be a huge deal.
So - even though I passed - there’s still a ton of other stuff that needs to get taken care of. I need to get a signature from the department chair. I need to get a signature from the Associate Dean (but he knows me - I did a rotation in his lab). I need to get a check for $65 (which I am VERY glad I do not have to pay for myself) from the department (Biological Sciences). THEN I need to bring the entire form AND check to the cashier’s office, get the check cashed (by them), and get the form stamped. FINALLY I can hand the stamped form into the Office of Graduate Studies - but only AFTER I’ve gotten a signature from them. I think this paperwork part is going to take longer, and be more stressful, then the presentation was!
Ok, so once again, the Advancement to Candidacy is the step at UCI after preliminary qualifying exams. You have to write a paper proposing your PhD thesis research, then give a presentation a week later. As I mentioned before, this is basically done to make sure that you have a realistic thesis project, and to give you feedback as well as to determine if your goals are achievable in a usual PhD timeframe (5-6 years - which of course is only like 3-4 years at this point).
I’m exhausted, so I’m going to pass out….
Yay! 
