Graduate Admissions Categories - Non-degree Seeking Students

The following three admission categories are used for non-degree-seeking graduate students:

1.    Non-Regular Graduate - Continuing Education, Non-Degree-Seeking Student (Continuing Education):  Student taking courses for graduate credit through the Continuing Education. Admission to this category does not constitute regular admission to a graduate program at UMKC. However, on the recommendation of the advisor and approval by the graduate officer, a limited number of graduate credit courses (normally no more than six credit hours) may be applied to individual degree programs after students have been regularly admitted to do graduate study.

2.    Visiting Graduate Student - (Visiting): Students who have been properly certified as graduate students at an accredited institution other than UMKC, and have permission to enroll in specific courses (including 5000-level courses) at UMKC. Note: Students who have previously been enrolled in a UMKC graduate program must have been in good academic standing at the end of their last UMKC graduate enrollment to take graduate courses as a visiting graduate student.

3.     Graduate Special Non-Degree Seeking - (Non-Degree Graduate Special): This classification is used for three categories of students: (1) Community access, non-degree-seeking students wanting access to graduate level courses not available through continuing education; (2) Potential graduate applicants, not meeting requirements for conditional admission and wanting to take graduate-level courses in order to qualify for admission; and (3) Community access students applying to graduate certificate programs. The following restrictions apply to Non-Degree Graduate Special Classification graduate students: Students apply to the academic unit, if declared. If undeclared, students are admitted as undeclared non-degree seeking graduate students in the School of Graduate Studies.

All graduate admissions and academic regulation policies apply.


International students may not be issued I-20 forms for admission under a Non-Degree Graduate Special classification.
At the discretion of a department or area, the graduate-level courses completed within the past 7 years with a grade of B (3.0) or better while classified as a Non-Degree Graduate Special student may be applied toward a graduate degree in that department or area. Of the courses listed on a degree, no more than 12 semester credit hours may have been completed while enrolled as a Non-Degree Graduate Special student.

All non-degree-seeking graduate students (Continuing Education, Visiting, and Non-Degree Graduate Special) wishing to enter a degree program as a degree seeking student must apply for and be regularly admitted to the department or school from which they want to receive an advanced degree.


Students admitted to any of the graduate classifications (whether degree seeking or non-degree seeking) will be enrolled automatically for graduate credit in courses numbered 300 to 499 unless they indicate on their enrollment forms that they do not want graduate credit for the course or the instructor specifies the course may only be taken for undergraduate credit. Courses numbered 299 and below may not be taken for graduate credit, are not calculated in a student's graduate grade-point average and cannot be included as credit courses on a graduate student's program of study.