To Students Wanting to Work With Me

Dr. Michael A. Covington

Associate Director, Institute for Artificial Intelligence

The University of Georgia, Athens, Georgia 30602-7415, U.S.A.

http://www.ai.uga.edu/~mc

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Note: From 2001 to 2006 my research was externally funded and strongly focused on computational psycholinguistics. That remains the main focus, and I lead a group of students and colleagues working in that area, but I am also open to working with students in other areas.

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Subject areas:

The areas in which I direct research are:

• computational psycholinguistics (the CASPR project), which is my predominant research area;
• computational linguistics (computer processing of human language);
• artificial intelligence (computer modeling of the human mind);
• engineering when it is an application of one of these;

and, in exceptional cases, theoretical or historical linguistics and/or computer science and closely related fields when relevant to my research interests.

I do not teach or direct research in mathematics, philosophy per se, or astronomy (despite being well known as an amateur astronomer).

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To students not yet at The University of Georgia:

In American universities, professors do not decide single-handedly whether to admit students. To be considered for admission, you must apply and pay an application fee. We cannot ever offer admission to anyone who has not applied for it.

Please read the appropriate departmental web pages to find out the requirements for the degrees in which you are interested.

The most common weakness on the part of applicants (whether American or foreign) is lack of mastery of spoken and written English. Even if English is your native language, please note that all graduate programs require you to do a lot of reading and to write papers in good English. Also, be familiar with scholarly writing and with library usage. My psycholinguistics work requires lots of library research — and by "library" I do not mean "Google."

All degrees, including the Ph.D., require course work (lecture courses), which are accompanied by examinations. Performance in the course work determines opportunities for research work.

I have worked with students in a number of degree programs, including:

• Ph.D. in Linguistics;
• Ph.D. in Computer Science;
• M.S. in Artificial Intelligence (predominantly);
• M.A. in Linguistics;
• M.S. in Computer Science;
• B.A. in Linguistics;
• B.S. in Cognitive Science;
• B.S. in Computer Science.

In exceptional cases I also work with students in other departments. For instance, I recently supervised an undergraduate honors thesis in the Department of Religion that concerned philosophical aspects of artificial intelligence.

The American admissions and funding process is designed to be fair to all applicants, not just those who have made personal contact or expressed eagerness. Submitting a good application, with samples of your scholarly work, is more important than e-mailing the professors in advance (unless you are specifically directed to contact them).

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To University of Georgia students:

The students whom I supervise are chosen for:

• Specific skills and interest in a suitable research area;
• Good performance in course work;
• Scholarly skills (library usage, ability to write research papers);
• Mastery of spoken and written English, particularly in computational linguistics (because you cannot analyze a language if you don't know it well yourself);
• Initiative and self-direction (because we cannot teach you, in the classroom, everything you will need to know).

To work with me, you should be eager to choose a specific piece of research and carry it out.

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Assistantships, funding, and paid positions:

Only a few assistantships, if any, are directly under my control. Click here for more information.

Most degree programs provide assistantships to some of their students. If you are applying for admission or are already here as a graduate student, make sure you have applied for an assistantship, since if you don't, you definitely will not get one.

In selecting students for assistantships, we do our best to be fair to all applicants, not just those who have personally contacted a professor. Assistantships are awarded on the basis of qualifications (including test scores, grades, and skills needed for the particular assistantship under consideration).

The Institute for Artificial Intelligence does not have paid internships, teaching assistantships, or paid postdoctoral fellowships.

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