Princeton's Ph.D. program in the Department of Classics recognizes the increasing diversity of approaches and subjects housed within the discipline and aims to provide students with the opportunity to develop a varied and comprehensive course of study appropriate to their developing research interests. The department currently offers four curricular options: literature and philology, history (Program in the Ancient World), classical philosophy, classical and Hellenic studies. Students concentrating on history are normally members of the Program in the Ancient World (PAW), those concentrating on philosophy, of the Program in Classical Philosophy (PCP), and those concentrating also on Byzantine and Modern Greek studies, of the joint Program in Classical and Hellenic Studies (CHS). Students select their curricular option at the beginning of the program, though later changes are possible in consultation with the director of graduate studies and the graduate committee. Membership in PAW is open also to students concentrating on literature and philology (LP), who must normally declare their decision to join PAW no later than January of their first year. All students, irrespective of their curricular option, are required to acquire a broad knowledge of ancient Greek and Roman literature and history by the time they complete their general examinations. Students make steady progress toward the completion of examinations and dissertation at a pace that takes account of their preparation at entrance and their progress while in residence. Students regularly complete the general examinations by October of their third year and complete the dissertation by the end of the fifth.