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Hi I was wondering if it were possible to skip undergraduate and apply to a graduate school. I have been taking some math courses through CTY a somewhat accredited program offered by Johns Hopkins university. They offer up to real analysis 1 and complex analysis 1. If I take up to there, would it be possible to skip undergraduate having self studied the higher level courses i.e topology/further analysis courses.

Joe Jameson
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    I think it would be difficult (but not impossible) to convince a graduate school admissions committee to accept you without an undergraduate degree. However if you visit some graduate departments and strongly impress some professors, they might be able to get the admissions committee to make an exception. A low percentage gambit. – quasi Jun 19 '21 at 23:24
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    I have seen someone do it. They got into a math grad program without a math or STEM undergrad degree. They put quite a bit of time (a few years) into studying and got to the point where they were able to publish a couple papers and put them on resume for grad application. – Aaron Hendrickson Jun 19 '21 at 23:31
  • What does "somewhat accredited" mean? – Joe Jun 20 '21 at 00:21
  • You can certainly apply to any graduate school you want. The probability of being accepted into that school without an undergraduate degree or even a high school degree is going to be very low unless your case is very special. – Somos Jun 20 '21 at 00:46
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    I assume you're an advanced high school student. I think the best approach in this situation is to still go to college, but just do graduate level math when you're in college. You can develop and grow a lot in that college time, even if you're already ready for grad school as a college freshman. Ultimately you'll be stronger than if you went straight to grad school. Even Terence Tao went to college, for example. You can consider going to college early. – littleO Jun 20 '21 at 05:28
  • @Aaron Hendrickson: They got into a math grad program without a math or STEM undergrad degree. --- Far more important than the degree would be math or math related course credits. Someone I knew when I was an undergraduate (we took several physics classes together) had an undergraduate degree in classics from Princeton (and no other degree), and yet completed a Masters degree in physics (where I was an undergraduate), and later a Ph.D. in physics elsewhere. Edward Witten majored in history and minored in linguistics as an undergraduate. – Dave L. Renfro Jun 20 '21 at 08:23

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If you plan to study further for Msc or Phd, you could and I think should just enroll in an integrated Bsc+Msc program. You can either

  • request that you take an exam of the courses you feel like you have learned enough about without taking the course itself,
  • or take an otherwise extraordinary amount of courses parallel in your first few semesters without attending the lectures.

Schools tend to accept both kind of requests with relative ease (compared to applying to gradschool without a degree), and you can negotiate with the related departments whether they support your plan or not in advance even before applying. This way you can trim down a year or two from an otherwise 4-5 years program essentially completing your Master's in only 2-4 years. This is a fairly common occurence, even with students that have no former college education but are just hardworking and talented.

You would get admitted as easily as any Bsc student, but would finish with a masters degree in essentially what is the timeframe for a Bachelors program. And you would receive both degrees without any hussle or worrying about getting admitted to the gradschool.

TL;DR: you should ask your targeted schools whether they support trimming down Bsc+Msc years instead of trying to get them to apply someone to a higher degree program without a bachelors.

Edit: format.

Steve
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