What are Independent Study Courses (ISCs)?

• ISCs, or Independent Study Courses, are courses which provide opportunities for NUSC students to obtain a personalised specialization on a specific topic. The student is given the freedom to work independently and to design the ISC in consultation with the faculty member to determine the assignments and research required for the course topic. The student is required to write a culminating essay or report at the conclusion of the course.
• ISCs must be pegged at level 3000 or higher.
• NUSC students (cohort matriculated AY2021/2022 and before) must read at least one ISC but no more than three.
• NUSC students who are granted the course waiver of 2 HSS + 2 ST are exempted from ISC requirement.  Examples of those granted the waiver include those on double degree programme (DDP) (between NUSC NUS partner faculties and with French Grandes Ecoles), SPS students, SDE students (ARK and IDS), NUSC Special programmes (Waseda DDP, cultural immersion at LSR/HC), and NOC (one-year).  Students will not be allowed to read any ISCs (or ISMs ride-on) to double-count towards major/faculty requirements. Please contact NUSC Academic Office if you have any queries.
• Individual faculties* have different regulations/guidelines regarding ISCs. Please refer to your faculty for prior advice and approval before embarking on your ISCs.

* All CHS-FASS students must read at least one ISC and up to a maximum of two ISMs, each of level-3000 or higher. Students from ELL department should not pursue more than one NUSC ISC at level-4000. NUSC History Honours students may not do NUSC ISCs at level-4000. Students are advised to speak to their department ISC coordinators and administrators on their department’s guidelines on ISCs. Please note that departmental ISCs (those with course codes ending with 4660, eg EC4660, HY4660) are not NUSC ISCs. You will not be allowed to double-count the departmental ISCs as NUSC ISCs. Department ISC also precludes Honours Thesis.

Independent Study Course (ISCs) may take one of the following forms, as elaborated below.

• Individual or Small Group Study

  A student can undertake an individual reading, research or project course under the guidance of a faculty member. A mutually agreed-upon proposal must be drawn up between the student and the mentor. This study proposal must state clearly the student’s obligations, the agreed-upon mode of assessment and the relevance of this course to his or her major. The student is required to write a culminating essay or report concerning the findings of the course topic, and should be actively involved in the presentation and discussion of the material.

  A small group of (not more than three) students may also undertake an ISC collectively but the group ISC must have a significant component of individual assessment. Group members may submit individual reports or a joint report, depending on the requirements of the mentor and the home faculty.

• Riding on existing Course

  Faculties with a large number of students and insufficient resources may mount ISCs as follows. Existing level 3000 and 4000 Course can be enhanced by a department into ISCs *. Although the student attends the same lectures as his or her non-NUSC coursemates, he or she participates in separate or additional tutorial sessions with the mentor, covering more material (at least twenty per cent), at greater depth, and involving his/her active participation. The NUSC student takes the same examination as the other students taking this module, but the examination should constitute a smaller percentage of the NUSC student's overall assessment. The NUSC student should be assessed more rigorously in the area of continual assessments, e.g. projects and term papers which pay particular attention to the student's active involvement and independence.

  * ISCs ride-ons are ONLY applicable to FOS students.

Procedure for ISC / ride-on ISC application

You can start registering for your ISCs in the following manner:

• Start formulating a topic of interest well in advance and approach your prospective supervisor (with relevant research interests) to discuss and write a proposal for the ISC.
• Start working on the project several weeks before the start of the semester so as to have sufficient time for any project revision if necessary.
• Upon agreement with the supervisor, you can apply for an ISC using the ISC contract form (from the respective home faculty website).
• Obtain endorsement from the relevant departmental ISC co-ordinator (prior to the deadline as stipulated on the ISC application form).
• Submit the endorsed ISC application form to your faculty Dean’s Office. Please refer to the respective faculties’ website for details on the timeline. You may also refer to the Registration Details for more info.
• If you encounter any difficulties when embarking on a cross-faculty ISC, you may approach NUSC Academic Office for assistance.

*Different departments in FASS have different regulations. Please approach your departmental coordinators for department-specific guidelines before embarking on the ISC.

Please note the following:

• For NUSC+Law students, the Directed Research will be double-counted towards NUSC ISC requirements.
• For NUSC+CDE students, certain major modules will be double-counted towards NUSC ISC requirements. Please refer to the CDE website for more information.

Important Notice:

With effect from Sem 1 AY2022/2023, students applying for the Department Ethic Review Committee (DERC), please email your application directly to NUSC Ethics Review @ nusc.ethics@nus.edu.sg for approval. 

Deadline for NUSC ISC in AY2024/2025

CHS - Cohort from AY2021-2022

• CHS students are allowed to double count NUSC ISC towards major and direct recognition of one Science UROP (%3288)
• CHS students on the CHS-DDP pathways are waived 2 INQ in this "Any Domain". Students will need to fulfill 3 HSS + 3 ST, with no ISC requirement

Special Programme in Science (SPS) Students

With effect from 2017 cohort, USP students enrolled in Special Programme in Science (SPS) will be granted a waiver of 4 USP Inquiry modules (2 HSS + 2 ST).  The waiver includes the ISM requirement.

• Directly recognise 2 Scientific Inquiries (SP2274 and SP3275)
• Directly recognise as NUSC ISC (SP3172)

Each participating faculty in the NUS College will appoint ISC coordinator(s) for its faculty.

Specific responsibilities of ISC coordinator:

• To ensure that the department has sufficient ISCs for its scholars for each semester.
• To assist and advise staff in the department who want to offer ISCs.
• To answer students' questions regarding what students can or cannot do (regarding ISCs) in their departments/faculties, and to act as student advisor.
• If possible, to assist the faculty advanced course committee to propose and launch new course based Course. Currently, the departments in a faculty may not fully coordinate their activities with the faculty committee, and hence may not be aware of advanced Course offered and policies at the faculty level. This lack of coordination not only creates confusion within the faculty, but also among the students.

Faculty ISC

Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences

For more information on reading newly-designed ISCs at FASS, please go to:
https://myportal.nus.edu.sg/studentportal/fas/ug/currentstd/usp-specific.html

School of Business

For more information on reading newly-designed or ride-on ISCs at BIZ, please go to:
http://bba.nus.edu/undergrad_special_usp.html

Faculty of Science

For more information on reading newly-designed, ride-on and UROPS-based ISCs at FOS, please go to:
https://myportal.nus.edu.sg/studentportal/sci/ug/Academics_USP.html

School of Computing

For more information on UROP-based, module-based ISMs, or ride-on ISCs at SoC, please go to:
http://www.comp.nus.edu.sg/programmes/ug/cs/usp/

Faculty of Engineering

For more information on reading newly-designed at FOE, please go to:
http://www.eng.nus.edu.sg/ugrad/usp.html

School of Design and Environment

For more information on modules read to fulfill ISCs at SDE, please go to:
http://www.sde.nus.edu.sg/acad/SDE_Usp.html

Faculty of Law

For more information on modules read to fulfill ISCs at Law, please go to:
http://law.nus.edu.sg/admissions/llb_usp.html

NUS College (NUSC) Department Ethics Review Committee (DERC) review students' projects that qualify for IRB review exemption.

The objectives of the DERC are:

1. to assess the level of risk to human subjects in research projects of the Department's academic staff members and students, and
2. to make recommendations on the appropriate type of ethics review for each research project

Exemption is given to the research projects that: Department Ethics Review

Fall into one or more of the IRB exemption categories (view this document for details of the categories)

1. Are of minimal risk;
2. Does not involve a vulnerable population;
3. Does not touch on sensitive topics; and
4. Does not involve deception/withholding of study’s stated aims and objectives from research participants.

Before obtaining the DERC approval, students should not start the data collection process. Students who violate this rule will be penalised. The DERC's request for amendments to the research protocol, if any, should be followed and reflected in the revised application.

Instructions:

1. Forms and documents must be submitted in soft copy to the following email, nusc.ethics@nus.edu.sg.
2. The NUSC DERC Application Form and Participant Information Sheet (PIS) & Consent Form (CF) can be downloaded here.
3. Submissions should include accompanying support documents such as consent form, survey questionnaire, interview/focus group question guide and/or other relevant information.
4. Please ensure that the PI of the project and the supervisor both sign the application form.
5. We will acknowledge your application within three working days and if you do not receive an acknowledgement, please email to nusc.ethics@nus.edu.sg .
6. The application takes approximately 14 days to process the review. Therefore, students should plan when to apply for the review.
7. For urgent applications outside of the above deadlines, please send an email to DERC requesting an urgent review. This request needs to be accompanied by the support of your supervisor.

Please direct all requests to nusc.ethics@nus.edu.sg.

Application Forms:

NUSC DERC Application Form

Participant Information Sheet (PIS) & Consent Form (CF)

List of ISC Undertaken in Sem 1 AY2020/AY2021

List of ISC Undertaken in Sem2 AY2020/2021

List of ISC Undertaken in Sem 1 AY2019/AY2020

List of ISC Undertaken in Sem 2 AY2019/AY2020

List of ISC Undertaken in AY2017/AY2018

List of ISC Undertaken in AY2017/AY2018

List of ISC Undertaken in AY2016/AY2017