Under some circumstances, students may petition for a non-East Asia specific course to be counted towards the nine content courses. For example, this could be for a methodology course in a particular discipline which will aid the student in preparing to conduct research for the M.A. thesis. Students must submit the Course Petition Form along with a syllabus for the class, no later than Friday of the second week of classes in the quarter the course is offered. If possible, students should commit to writing a paper or undertaking a project that focuses on East Asia as part of the course. A maximum of three courses can be petitioned to count towards the degree. Petitioned courses should be 3 units or greater, at the graduate level whenever possible, and must be taken for a letter grade where available.