Electrical Engineering Technical Electives

All electrical engineering undergraduates must complete a range of technical electives designed to ensure they have the appropriate breadth and depth of training in electrical engineering, a rigorous advanced laboratory experience, and a sophisticated and sustained exposure to engineering design. 

Requirements for students who matriculated Fall 2021 - Summer 2024:

A total of 13 credits of 400-level ENEE technical electives must be completed and distributed among the following categories:

  • Category A. Advanced Theory and Applications: minimum of 3 credits
  • Category B. Advanced Laboratory: minimum of 2 credits
  • Category C. Capstone Design: minimum of 3 credits
  • (See below)

In addition, students must satisfy the Specialization Requirement. This entails completing at least two courses from a single area of concentration within electrical engineering. ECE has six such Specialty Areas.

Requirements for students who matriculated Fall 2024 and beyond:

 A total of 22 credits of 400-level ENEE technical electives must be completed and distributed among the following categories:

  • Category A. Advanced Theory and Applications: minimum of 3 credits
  • Category B. Advanced Laboratory: minimum of 2 credits
  • Category C. Capstone Design: minimum of 3 credits
  • (See below)

Completing the minimum required credits from Category A-C comes to 8 credits. The remaining 14 credits may be taken from any one category or combination of categories.  

While not required, students are encouraged to take several upper-level elective courses in the same sub-discipline. The electrical engineering sub-disciplines are:

  • Communications and Signal Processing
  • Computer Engineering
  • Controls
  • Electrophysics
  • Microelectronics
  • Power Systems

Students can take up to nine credits of upper-level electrical engineering electives from approved non-ENEE courses related to that sub-discipline.

Please read carefully and make note of the following special cases. Information in this section applies to both curricula. 

  1. A second Capstone Design course may be used as a substitute for the required Advanced Theory and Applications course.  However, students who have already completed a capstone design course or who are registered for their first will have to wait until the beginning of the semester to receive permission for a second capstone course – assuming seats are available.
  2. Students may enroll in a second advanced laboratory.  However, students who have already completed an advanced laboratory or who are registered for their first will have to wait until the beginning of the semester to receive permission for a second advanced laboratory – assuming seats are available.
  3. Upper-level ENEE elective courses may be used to satisfy General Technical Elective requirements.  However, any upper-level ENEE course used for this purpose may NOT then be used to satisfy the ENEE Technical Elective Requirement.  
  4. ENEE499: A maximum of five credits of approved ENEE 499: “Senior Projects in Electrical Engineering” may be used to satisfy the electrical engineering technical electives. Approved ENEE499L credits may satisfy the Category B requirement. Students in the ECE Honors Program are permitted to count up to six credits of ENEE499/499H. NOTE:  ENEE499 credits cannot be used to satisfy the Category C Capstone requirement.

 If you have any questions about how these requirements affect your current selection of senior EE electives, please contact an advisor.

ENEE Technical Elective Courses:

Below is a list of courses that can be used for the ENEE Technical Elective Requirements.  When using this list for academic planning purposes, please make sure you check on Testudo (www.testudo.umd.edu) for the course availability, as not all of these courses are offered every semester.

Category A: Advanced Theory and Applications (3 credit minimum)
 

* Please note that ENEE456 (Cryptography) is not a Cat. A course and will only count towards the MATH Gen-Tech elective (for the pre-Fall 2024 curriculum). 

Category B: Advanced Laboratory (2 credit minimum)

 

Category C: Capstone Design (3 credits minimum)
 

[1]: Only 5 total credits of ENEE488/ENEE499/ENEE499L may be applied to the degree requirements. An exception is for ECE Honors students, who can apply 6 credits of ENEE499/499H.

 

 


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