I. Educational Objectives

The PhD’s program offered by the School of Information Management aims to cultivate students morally, intellectually and physically. And it’s important to make them form a seriously hard, rigorous and realistic style of study and the spirit of innovation. Further, the students will build a solid theoretical foundation for management and develop the capabilities to conduct macro and micro researches in management.

By accomplishing this program, students should obtain the following knowledge and skills:

(1) To master the basic theory and systematical professional knowledge, and be proficient in reading professional books and writing preliminary scientific papers.

(2) To cultivate a rigorous and realistic attitude and style, as well as an innovative and realistic spirit and good ethics of scientific research, develop abilities to undertake independent scientific research of this discipline independently.

(3) To be able to skillfully use computers and information technology to solve problems in this subject’s areas and have some new insights.

(4) To be competent in preliminary teaching, management and research work of the relevant disciplines or adjacent disciplines.

II. Program Description

Information Science is a second-level discipline under the first-level discipline of Library Information and Archives Management. Information Science is a science that studies the generation, processing, transmission, and utilization of information, the theoretical methods and techniques of information management, and the means of modern information technology to maintain the optimal performance of information systems. There are 5 research fields in this major:

(1) Information Organization and Retrieval

   It mainly studies the principles and methods about information organizations; knowledge and information databases; retrieval systems of computer information; network information retrieval and advances of other multimedia information retrieval.

(2) Information Management and E-government

   It mainly studies the theories and methods of information construction; the principles, mode of operation and the means of management concerning e-government; resource management theory and method, system planning; construction and application and theories and methods of government information resource management.

(3)Competitive Intelligence and Decision Support System

   It refers to the formation evolution and trends of competitive strategies; its analysis tools and theories; the plan of competitive intelligence services; sources of competitive intelligence; means of competitive intelligence analysis; the organization of anti-competitive intelligence work and its intelligence warning and concepts, features, functions, basic principles, design and development of the competitive intelligence system and the decision support system.

(4) Information and Services

   It studies theories and methods of information consulting and services; reference and consulting of literature information department; the consultancy of enterprises information, management reference, decision, and digital reference services; the building of network reference service platform and its implementation and the construction and the technical implementation of network information service system etc.

(5) Information Policy and Management

   It refers to the theory and basic principles of information systems management; the technical and economic problems, evaluation, development methods and management about information system; basic configuration, principles and application of information ecosystem; domestic and foreign information relating to policy and legal information; and knowledge management definitions, attributes, characteristics, type, content, pattern, techniques and methods.

III. Schooling and Credits

It will take 3 years to 6 years at most for schooling, of which the period of courses is 1 year, and the period of dissertation work is generally no less than 2 years. Total credits are 18 (18 hours/credit), including 14 credits for courses, and 4 credits for practice. PhD students are not allowed to graduate in advance.

IV. Curriculum

The curriculum and teaching schedule will implemented according to the benchmark schooling system for three years. (Specific courses information, see "curriculum schedule of  postgraduates courses in School of Information Management ").

V. Practice

Doctoral's teaching practice will be arranged in the second year. Teaching programs include a specialized courses section as a teaching assistant in junior English teaching, or undertake comprehensive counseling work for undergraduates (including answering questions, practice lesson, correcting students' papers, computer counseling, etc.), 1 credit for those who pass the assessment.

PhD students should participate in academic activities at least four times, and academic activities outside school should be included once a time,with a more than 800 words report every time. After the practice, the tutor group will do a performance assessment, and evaluate the results, 1 credit for those who pass the assessment.

PhD students must participate in mentor’s research project and undertake specific scientific research tasks. The examination of scientific research practice is based on published papers, books, research reports, or designed software systems. If the student does not have a signature in the scientific research results, his/her mentor shall issue the certification materials to prove the participation in the research project. 1 credit for those who pass the assessment.

Professional practice is generally arranged in the first or second summer vacation, for about 4 weeks. After the internship, the intern units give the the evaluation opinions and the evaluation results. Students write a summary report of 3000-5000 words, the guide teacher give the evaluation results. The students' comprehensive performance is the average of the internship units and teachers assess results, 1 credit for those who pass the assessment.

For who failed the practice examination, can not participate in the dissertation.

VI. Scientific Research

The PhD student of this major must publish 2 academic papers in SCI/EI/CSSCI as the first author (or the mentor as the first author), with signature being Central China Normal University.

VII. Dissertation

Doctoral dissertation work is an important part of postgraduate training. Students can not only achieve mastery through a comprehensive study, but also receive comprehensive training of research abilities and practical abilities. Dissertations is one of the fundamental basis for granting a degree.

Students’ dissertation topics should be determined in no later than the second semester, and prepare for opening report. Dissertation topics and requirements are as follows:

(1)Topics should be important issues in management theories and practical values;

(2)Rich in content, and with full-accurate data;

(3)Theories expounded fully, exactly, logically;

(4)With an obvious point, scientific conclusion and personal insight;

(5) Structured, standardized format, language fluency.

The basic process of dissertation work includes: (1) Choosing topics; (2) Opening report; (3) Mid-term examination; (4) Dissertation appraisal and defence; (5) Modification after defence.

VIII. Training Methods

It takes the combination of tutors’ guidance with steering group collective training; and integrating theories with practice, adhering to the principle of combining unified theoretical learning with scientific research. The teachers will use teaching methods of the combination of lectures and self-study, discussion and the combination of the campus learning and off-campus practice teaching, etc. It also important to strengthen the graduate student's theoretical basis, broaden their knowledge, strive to cultivate their scientific research abilities and the abilities to work independently, and encourage them to actively seek independent innovation for continuous improvement.

X. Provisions

1. Each graduate student shall develop a personal training (learning) program combining the reality, the guidance of mentor and the professional training plan. Then he/she can report to the management offices of the school and international students for the record after the examination and approval of the teacher and professional steering group leaders.

  2. Whether students’ training scheme and complete or not, it is  the fundamental basis for the validation study of graduation and degree-granting.

  3. All of the provisions must be appraised in the training programs. Examation score that reaches 60 points is qualified for earning the corresponding credit, with two ways of test: test paper and thesis. Those who did not pass the exam can participate in normal make-up over the next year. Practical aspects and opening report use appraisal way. Graduate students must participate in the examination within the specified time, and if there are special reasons not to take the exam on time, he/she must submit an application to delay the test. After the approvals of departments and the leaders, then he can delay the tests. Those who don't take the exam without any authorization cannot participate in the normal make-up, and the courses’ grade will be 0, unless he participates in graduation make-up.