The graduate program prepares students for technical leadership roles in industry, academia and government. The training provides students with a fundamental understanding of engineering sciences so that graduates can develop creative and innovative approaches to the world's important engineering problems. 

The purpose of the PhD program in electrical and computer engineering is to produce graduates who can think independently and solve engineering problems based on first-principle scientific and mathematical concepts. The training to produce such a graduate involves the in-depth study of a challenging research problem that has not been previously solved or has not been solved to a desired level of effectiveness. The student is expected to work closely with a faculty advisor on the research problem (resulting in a dissertation), and it is expected that the overwhelming majority of his/her time in the PhD program will be devoted to solving the research problem.