Applicants who have been offered admission to one of our programs should have received the following:

A Program Offer Letter: This indicates that we have referred you to the Graduate College for admission as a degree-seeking student.
An Official Notice of Admission from Illinois Graduate Admissions: This will be delivered as an email with the subject line “Illinois Admission Decision.”

Write down your University Identification Number (UIN), as you will need this for future steps

Once you have received these items, it is time to decide if you’ll join us as a degree-seeking student through the Graduate College Application Portal. You will make one of three choices:

Accept Your Offer: This will secure your spot in your program. No enrollment deposit is required!
Defer Your Acceptance: You have the option to defer your admission for up to 1 calendar year. No deposit is required. 
Decline Your Offer: If you no longer want to join our program, please let us know by declining your offer through the portal.

We invite you to reach out to us if you have questions prior to making your decision.

Your UIN is a 9-digit number that serves to uniquely identify your University account. It usually starts with a 6. If you were last affiliated with the University of Illinois before 1996, your account may not have a UIN assigned to it. If you don’t know your UIN, there are a number of places you can look, one of those is in your Offer letter.

https://answers.uillinois.edu/illinois/page.php?id=48097

Claim your NetID. You will need your University Identification Number (UIN), which is provided with your admission letter.

Set this up and learn more on the NetID Center page. Bookmark this page, as you will need this anytime you are prompted to change your password. important! Sometimes changing a password within one system will not fully propagate to other systems- using the Net ID Center page will avoid this issue.

Set up Two-Factor authentication on your device using the Duo Mobile app. This app makes it very easy to access a variety of applications and web pages throughout the University of Illinois system. You must first have a Net ID in order to access the Knowledgebase and/or set up two-factor authentication.

Your email account is your netid@illinois.edu. Once you have claimed your Net ID and it has been fully set up, you can configure your email on your devices: https://techservices.illinois.edu/email-how-to-log-in/

We encourage you to regularly check your school e-mail. We discourage you from forwarding your school address to another account, because not all messages can be forwarded and sometimes other email providers mark the messages as Spam, so you may miss out on important information.

Please take the time to set up your email and two-factor authentication on your devices to make it easy to check your Illinois email address from anywhere.

See also Set up your @Illinois email address on your device(s), including your smartphone.

If you are coded as an online student, you can order a picture-less iCard.

https://icard.uillinois.edu/public/get-card.cfm

https://online.illinois.edu/getting-started/other-important-info-for-online-students/obtain-a-photoless-id-card

Learn about and set up your CGScholar account. This does not require a University of Illinois account. Note that courses taught by faculty outside of our concentration use different technology platforms, such as Canvas. To see a list of courses taught by LDL Faculty, click here.

Attend the next CGScholar Bootcamp

Set up your University Library account and start exploring the Library resources! You do NOT need your own account to access subscription e-resources (i.e. journals) from Library webpages. This can be done using your NetID and Password. Visit this Library FAQ page for more login details.

Link your @Illinois.edu email account to Illinois’ Google apps system. We use Google apps for several things including a roster and Google chat. (Be sure to always check which Google account you are on, it may say that you don’t have access to something, but that may be because you are on your personal gmail or other Google Workspaces account.)

Set up access to the University of Illinois’ Box files sharing app. Similar to Google apps, be sure that you are logged in to the correct account when trying to access files shared with you.

Link your accounts here: https://cloud-dashboard.illinois.edu/cbdash/

Become familiar with our LDL web site (this site), even menus that you feel may not be relevant now. And check back often, as we are regularly enhancing our web site to meet your needs and address your questions.

Our FAQ pages change each time we receive a new question.
Common Forms
Student Self Service (Personal Information, Registration & Records, Account Billing Information, U I Pay, etc.)
College of Education’s web site
Graduate College web site
Course Explorer
Technology Services
College of Education Calendar of Events
Online Program Resources
LDL Doctoral Exam-Dissertation Sequence Resources (but many of these are useful as you start your journey)

MASSMAIL: MASSMAIL emails are sent to all UIUC students, faculty, and staff. These emails will typically include important University wide announcements and updates.
EPOL Newsletter: This is a weekly newsletter that is sent out by the EPOL Department. This will contain information that specifically applies to EPOL students, such as information about upcoming events, course offerings, important dates, job postings, etc.
College of Education at Illinois Weekly Announcements: This is an email of weekly announcements for all College of Education students. You can typically find exciting COE news, announcements, and featured events in this email.
Graduate College GradLinks: Weekly newsletter with key information for graduate students.
Degree Specific Listserv: As a student, you may also receive information via your degree specific listserv. Emails sent via your respective listserv will include important information pertaining to your specific program (i.e., EdD, EdM /CERT, IDMTC, or non degree)

As you progress through your program, you will work with both your Faculty Advisor, Co-Advisor, and/or the Online Student Advisor. Here are some of the circumstances in which each of your advisors can assist you. LDL-specific questions should be directed to Dr. Stuart L Mattingly. CG Scholar questions should be directed to a teaching assistant.

CoE Graduate Student Services Office: gradservices@education.Illinois.edu
Office of Online Programs: onlineprograms@education.Illinois.edu
Office of the Registrar: registration@illinois.edu
IT Partners at Education: support@education.Illinois.edu
Financial Aid: finaid@illinois.edu

Join the LDL Student-Alumni online community in CGScholar and actively participate by asking and/or responding to questions, sharing tips or resources, read LDL-related news, and more.
Join our LDL MS Teams space where you can engage in real-time collaboration with peers and the LDL program advisor. Contact the LDL program advisor for the invitation link.
If you are coded as an online student, you will receive an invitation to an online community hosted by the College of Education Online Programs office
Join the GradMap community: https://grad.illinois.edu/gradmap/welcome (some sections are geared towards on-campus students)

Visit our Library Resources page that links you to several library-related resources

See the Accounts and Technology sections below regarding your account and other information.

If you are a student with a disability, please contact Disability Resources and Educational Services (DRES) to request and obtain disability-related assistance.

Attend a New LDL Student Onboarding session for your certificate or degree program If you are a non-degree seeking student with the goal of transferring to a degree-seeking program, you are encouraged to attend the degree-specific onboarding session. Also, if you did not attend an Information Session prior to applying, you are encouraged to attend one of those, as not all information is repeated.

1 – Join the New LDL Course Participant Onboarding community on CGScholar and view the series of “admin updates“. Add a comment to ask questions.

2 – Attend the live New LDL Course Participant Onboarding session, usually held the first week of each term during the Office Hours timeslot. Visit the Happening Now page for the current live session schedule.

Academic Writing and the Literature Review Genre: Required for LDL doctoral students, encouraged for all others.

We use CGScholar, our LDL website, and Zoom to administer our courses.

Learn about and set up your CGScholar account. This does not require a University of Illinois account. Note that courses taught by faculty outside of our concentration use different technology platforms, such as Canvas. To see a list of courses taught by LDL Faculty, click here.

Attend the next CGScholar Bootcamp

Check out these videos produced by your Education library, Nancy O’Brien on how to navigate the library search databases.

Begin considering how you will build and organize your Research Library. This is something that you will want to start early and maintain throughout your graduate education experience. Keep your sources organized by using free tools, such as Mendeley or Zotero.

Review software (University of Illinois Webstore) and hardware (University of Illinois Tech Zone) discounts that may be available to you.

Office 365, Adobe Creative Cloud, and Qualtrics are free while you are a student.

For all general technology support needs, refer to the University’s Technology Services Help Desk.

Review both your degree-specific requirements as well as the College of Education Graduate Student Handbook and the Graduate College Handbook.

Non-degree Certificate of Specialization
Graduate Certificate
EdM
EdD and PhD

If you earned a graduate degree with us previously, you will have a different set of requirements.
If you have taken graduate level courses at the University of Illinois that did not go towards an earned degree, those can be petitioned to transfer towards your current degree. Graduate courses taken towards a certificate can be applied towards one of our degree programs as long as it was not used for a different degree program.

Fill out the Graduate Student petition after your official first term has started

Use Course Explorer to view the current and upcoming course schedules. Course Explorer provides the schedule of classes by term and serves to help students when planning their course schedules (search for courses by term, part of term, mode of instruction, and/or department).

See the current and upcoming courses taught by LDL Faculty
See our full list of courses and annual schedule
See all University courses for the upcoming or previous terms

Fill out a program plan (you must have a NetID to access this. See the Accounts section above.)

Register on self service (available after you receive your official acceptance from the Graduate College)
Instructions on How to Register
Confirm that you are looking for the correct online section (e.g., “ONL” if you are coded as an online students. On-campus students should look for section A or B, typically.)
Reference the Office of the Registrar’s Academic Calendar for registration dates and deadlines

Important: If you are coded as on-campus EdD or EdM student on a tuition waiver, you may encounter issues attempting to register for online courses. Email gradservices@illinois.edu and indicate that you are on a tuition waiver asking for an override. On-campus PhD students are not allowed to take online courses, with very few exceptions.

See also the University’s Registration FAQ

Note that if you are a non-degree student or want to enroll in courses before your official start term, your registration is coordinated through Center for Innovation in Teaching & Learning (CITL)

Registration Policies for non-degree seeking students
Registration Process Overview for non-degree seeking students
Register with CITL

Doctoral students take between 10 and 13 regular courses before beginning the Exam-Dissertation Sequence (EDS). The EDS is a six-step sequence helping you to prepare for your qualifying exam, preliminary exam, and ultimately your final defense and dissertation deposit.

We ask that you not think about your actual dissertation too early. It can be overwhelming to feel like you have to make such a big decision so early. The good news is, you don’t need to! If you feel you have a dissertation idea in mind already, it is still good to not set limits too early. Also, a certain level of rigor is expected during the EDS.

The “From Coursework to the Dissertation” page provides you with time-based action items on how you can leverage your coursework to help you be better-prepared for your qualifying exams and your dissertation – whether you have a dissertation topic in mind or not.

Check out what you can do before you take your first class.

You have multiple advisors to assist you with beginning and ultimately completing your degree. See LDL Program Team for more information.

Faculty Advisor: Dr. Mary Kalantzis or Dr. Bill Cope
EdM LDL Faculty Advisor: Dr. Vania Castro
If you were formerly a University of Illinois student, your advisor may have defaulted to your previous advisor. It will be important to check this and also fill out an advisor change form, if necessary.
LDL Program and Dissertation Advisor and Co-Advisor: Dr. Kara Francis
Online Programs Advisor: Brianna Davis

After filling in your program plan (as best you can), you may schedule an optional advising session with the LDL Program Advisor (Dr. Kara Francis; kstucki@illinois.edu) to discuss your tentative program plan and degree goals.

You may also meet with Brianna Davis, Online Programs Advisor through her Online Student Advising Appointment Calendy link or email her at bmdavis2@illinois.edu

Before classes begin, learn about course logistics for our regular LDL courses. Note that courses taught by faculty outside of our concentration follow a different approach and use a different learning management system.

We invite you to consider getting a headstart on your first course, if taught by one of our LDL faculty.

Refer to this page for some suggestions on how to get started.

The Student Code is a collection of rules, regulations, policies, and procedures that apply to, or otherwise directly impact, students at the University of Illinois Urbana Champaign.

Student Rights and Responsibilities
General Policies and Regulations
Academic Policies and Regulations

Read our policy here: https://ldlprogram.web.illinois.edu/academic-integrity-statement/

The following resources from the Center for Innovation in Teaching and Learning are available to help you to be successful as an online student:

Getting Ready to Learn Online at the University of Illinois
Writing Support
A day in the life of an online student
Staying organized
Tips for success
Benefits of studying online