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International Students Admissions

An international Master's applicant is a student who wishes to study at our university on an F-1 (student) visa, who has received a post-secondary degree from a regionally accredited college or university within the United States or outside the United States that meets our accreditation standards. 

Strict requirements are bold faced.

GPA Requirements

Admission requires a 3.0 GPA in the upper-division Computer Science courses and at least a 3.0 GPA in the last 60 semester units (or last 90 quarter units) attempted.  

GRE Requirements

The general test of the Graduate Record Examination (GRE) is encouraged for all applicants.  The institution code is 4155.  The Department Code is 0402.  

Minimum GRE scores: 

  • Verbal 143
  • Quantitative 155
  • Analytical Writing 3.5 (or NEW: 3.0 with TOEFL Writing 20 or above / IELTS Writing 6.0 or above) 

TOEFL or IELTS Requirements

All applicants must have (unless they possess a bachelor's degree from a post-secondary institution where English was the principal language of instruction)

  • TOEFL score of 80 iBT or above OR
  • IELTS overall band score of 6.0 with a writing score no lower than 6.0 and no section score below 5.5 OR
  • Duolingo score of 110 or above

Courses needed to make up undergraduate deficiencies: 

  • CS 311 Data Structures and Algorithms -- You must have passed this class before starting the Master's degree.
  • CS 331 Computer Architecture
  • CS 351 Programming Languages
  • CS 370 Introduction to Software Engineering
  • CS 433 Operating Systems
  • MATH 270 Basic Discrete Mathematics

If you have 3 courses or less missing, you may be admitted as Conditionally Classified.  Upon completion of the remaining units, your status will change to Classified.  If you are missing more than 3 courses, you cannot be admitted into the program.  

 For course descriptions, please see the CSUSM Course Catalog