Admission Procedure in PhD Programmes

Contacts

Admission Procedure 2024/2025 II

Information on the Admission Procedure

Admission procedure 2024/2025 for all doctoral programs taught in English at Charles University, Faculty of Mathematics and Physics, with the exception of the Bioinformatics and Computational Biology programme

To apply for one of our doctoral study programmes taught in English you must hold or be working towards a master's diploma and have the necessary abilities for research. The latter consists mainly of the knowledge of the chosen field, English language, and the ability of independent creative work as well as teamwork. The assessment of these abilities is based on the documents submitted with your application and on the entrance examination, if the latter is not waived (see below). The entrance examination has two parts – examination in the expertise in the field (subject examination) and examination in the English language (language examination).

The admission procedure commences with the submission of an application form.

Important dates:

• Application's submission till November 30, 2024
• Letters of recommendation are due till November 30, 2024
• The language examination waiver must be requested and the compliance with one of the conditions for the waiver must be documented till November 30, 2024
• Application for the waiver of the subject entrance examination as soon as possible, but no later than November 30, 2024
• Invitation to take the entrance examination in mid-December, 2024
• Entrance examination dates: January 15 and 16, 2025
• Alternative entrance examination date: January 23, 2025, can be requested for serious reasons only
• A document certifying completion of a university education at Master's level needs to be delivered as soon as possible after the application submission, and in any case no later than February 28, 2025.

Admission for studies

Admission for studies in one of our doctoral study programmes taught in English except the programme Physics Education and General Problems of Physics will be granted to the applicants who

• Submitted a complete application form together with all obligatory attachments before the deadline,
• successfully passed the subject part of the entrance examination or were granted a waiver of it,
• successfully passed the language part of the entrance examination or were granted a waiver of it.

Admission for studies to the doctoral study programme Physics Education and General Problems of Physics taught in English will be granted to the applicants who

• Submitted a complete application form together with all obligatory attachments before the deadline,
• successfully passed the subject part of the entrance examination and achieved rank 1 in the ranking of applicants,
• successfully passed the language part of the entrance examination or they got a waiver of it

Invitation to subject entrance examination

The invitation to the subject entrance examination will be sent to those applicants, who

• submitted a complete application together with its obligatory attachments 2,3 and 4 before the deadline,
• paid the application fee,
• did not obtain the confirmation of the waiver of the subject entrance examination before mid-December 2024.The invitation to an entrance examination is delivered through the University Electronic Information System. In mid-December, 2024, all applicants without a waiver receive an invitation to take the entrance examination from the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics. If the Faculty approves the waiver after sending out the invitation, the invitation ceases to apply.

Entrance examination to all programmes taught in English, except the programme Physics Education and General Problems of Physics

The entrance examination consists of two parts, subject part and a language part. The subject part of the entrance examination takes the form of a discussion about the chosen study programme. The committee gives the applicant three questions related to the chosen study programme. The committee judges the correctness of the answer, the knowledge of the field and overall readiness for doctoral studies. Each answer is evaluated on the binary Pass/Fail scale. The applicant must obtain three passing grades. If the applicant has chosen one of the thesis topics offered by the faculty and has obtained an approval of a future supervisor, or if the committee accepts the annotation of the applicant‘s own topic, the applicant will successfully pass the exam with only two passing grades from three questions.

Entrance examination to the programme Physics Education and General Problems of Physics taught in English

The entrance examination consists of two parts, subject part and a language part. The subject part of the entrance examination takes the form of a discussion about the field of Physics education and general problems of physics. The committee gives the applicant three questions related to the field of the study programme. The committee judges the correctness of the answers, the knowledge of the field and overall readiness for doctoral studies. Each answer is evaluated on the scale of 0–30 points, the applicant can therefore obtain at most 90 points for all three answers. In order to pass the exam, the applicant must obtain at least 60 points. If there is more than one successful applicant, the committee will rank the applicants according to the total number of points they obtained. Admission for studies to the doctoral study programme Physics Education and General Problems of Physics taught in English will be granted to the candidate who successfully passes both parts of the entrance examination and obtains the highest score from the subject part of the examination among all applicants.

Language part of the entrance examination

The language part of the entrance examination consists of verification of knowledge of the English language in the form of a written test conducted in person. The applicant may obtain a maximum of 100 points, the threshold for passing the exam is 50 points. If the applicant cannot take part in the face-to-face test for objective reasons, it is possible to take the test online at the Department of Language Education of the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics under the same conditions. In this case, the student must contact the Study Department at the latest two working days before the day of the exam and inform them of the reasons.

Waiver conditions of the subject entrance examination

The subject entrance examination cannot be waived for applicants to the study programme Physics Education and General Problems of Physics.

The subject entrance examination may be waived for applicants for any study programme (with the exception of the programme Physics Education and General Problems of Physics) who have chosen one of the thesis topics offered by the faculty and obtained an approval of a future supervisor, and for whom at least one of the following conditions applies:

1. their original scientific work on a relevant topic has been published, or has been accepted for publication, in a reviewed medium indexed by MathSciNet, SCOPUS or ISI Web of Knowledge databases;
2. they have achieved excellent results in their master's study programme in the field of Physics, Computer Science, or Mathematics, corresponding to the field of the doctoral programme they are applying to;
3. they have achieved other remarkable results testifying their ability for doctoral studies.

It is necessary to apply for the waiver and prove that the applicant satisfies some of the above conditions, by no later than November 30, 2024

Conditions for a language examination waiver

The language examination will be waived if the applicant fulfills at least one of the following waiver conditions:

A. The applicant spent at least two years of his/her previous education at secondary or university level with English as the sole language of instruction in one of the following countries: Australia, Canada, India, Ireland, Malta, New Zealand, South Africa, UK or USA.

B. The applicant does not need to take the language examination of English if (s)he has already passed one of the following exams (in some cases we recognize the exam only with a minimum score or level):

• General State Language Examination in English in the Czech Republic
• examination in English at Charles University, Faculty of Mathematics and Physics
• TOEFL (paper) – 550 points
• TOEFL (computer) – 213 points
• TOEFL (internet) – 80 points
• IELTS – 7 points
• C2 Proficiency (formerly known as CPE) – Pass
• C1 Advanced (formerly known as CAE) – Pass
• B2 First (formerly known as FCE) – Grade A
• ESOL International (C1 – C2)
• TELC (The European Language Certificates) – TELC English C1 – Pass
• UNIcert English for Mathematicians: Level C1 – level C1
• Melab – 77 points
• Examination for the Certificate of Proficiency in English (ECPE) – Pass
• Test of English for International Communication (TOEIC) – 605 points

The language examination waiver and the compliance with one of the conditions mentioned above must be requested before the deadlines mentioned above.

Admission procedure 2024/2025 for the Bioinformatics and Computational Biology programme

Application Form Requisites

APPLICATION SUBMISSION

Applications are to be submitted electronically via the Student Information System of Charles University at https://is.cuni.cz/studium/eng/prijimacky/. The amount of fee is 1500 CZK. You need to fill in the application form, confirm it, and submit it in the system. Electronically submitted applications do not need to be sent in paper form.

After the completion and submission of an electronic application, the information system generates a 6-digit ID number for each applicant; this ID should be given in any subsequent correspondence about the application with the Department of Student Affairs.

In the application the applicant chooses a study programme, and states a desired doctoral thesis topic (from those offered by the programme). We recommend discussing these at the department concerned before submitting the application.

ATTACHMENTS TO THE APPLICATION

A. Obligatory

1. A document proving the completion of a master's study programme; A document certifying the completion of a university education at Master's level needs to be delivered as soon as possible after the application submission, and in any case no later than February 28, 2025. This is not required from students and graduates of the Charles University, Faculty of Mathematics and Physics. Those applicants who completed their education at a university abroad, must deliver one of the following documents: a document about a general recognition of equality or validity of a foreign university graduation certificate in the Czech Republic (so called „nostrification“), or a foreign document about a foreign university education if it is automatically recognized in the Czech Republic, according to its international agreements, without further official processing (university diploma from Slovakia, Poland, Hungary, Slovenia), or a foreign document about completing university education which will be assessed by the faculty itself (no fee is being charged).

2. Two letters of recommendation; letters of recommendation from professors and employers who can comment on your recent professional accomplishments and your qualifications for pursuing a doctoral degree in Computer Science, Mathematics or Physics. You should arrange for letters of recommendation to be sent directly by your referees to the e-mail address phd@mff.cuni.cz till November 30, 2024.

3. A brief CV.

4. A letter of motivation.

B. Optional

• An application for a waiver of the subject or language part of the entrance examination and its attachments
• A brief annotation of a proposed thesis topic in case that the applicant has not chosen a thesis topic offered by the programme

APPLICATION FEE

An application fee must be paid for each application. The application fee is 1500 CZK. The fee is to be paid by the application submission deadline to the bank account below with the 6-digit ID applicant number as “a specific symbol” or a message for the recipient. The fee can either be paid in EUR or in CZK. The application fee is non-refundable. The fee can be paid by postal order or by bank transfer. When paying by bank transfer, the applicants are obliged to pay any additional fees charged by the banks (esp. when paying from abroad).

Bank details for the application fee: Bank: Komercni banka Account number: 21210277/0100 IBAN: CZ49 0100 0000 0000 2121 0277 SWIFT: KOMB CZ PP

If the application is not completed and confirmed, or the application fee is not fully paid in due time, and the deficiencies are not corrected in the additional time permitted, the faculty will officially terminate the admission procedure.

Other important resources:

• Application Form
• Admission Procedure Status
• Study Programmes and Branches
• Charles University Admission

Programme specific information

• Programme Computational linguistics
• Programme Computer Science – Software Systems, study at
  • D3S
  • KSI
  • KSVI
• Programme Computer Science – Visual computing and computer games
• Programme Bioinformatics and computational biology
• Programme Biophysics, chemical and macromolecular physics

Archive

• 2024/2025 I
• 2023/2024
• 2022/2023
• 2021/2022
• 2020/2021
• 2019/2020
• 2018/2019