Thesis
The committee that evaluates the thesis shall produce a report on the thesis.
It is desirable that the committee should reach a unanimous conclusion, but in the event of dissenting opinions separate reports may be necessary. The committee should as far as possible give the report a general and concise form. Positive reports should be 1-2 pages in length, negative reports 2-3 pages.
Even if the committee concludes that the work should not be approved, the committee may recommend a reworking of the thesis. In such cases information to this effect shall be given explicitly. However, where the committee is of the opinion that fundamental changes are necessary with respect to theory, hypothesis, material and/or method for the work to be worthy of approval, the committee should not recommend submission of the same thesis in a reworked version for new evaluation.
The report should make clear how the committee has evaluated the following questions:
- Are the research questions and the hypotheses clear and have they been formulated precisely enough?
- Are the research questions and the hypotheses fruitful in terms of the research situation?
- To what extent are the materials referred to and the methods used suited to the purpose?
- Have the conclusions that the material allows been drawn, and are they tenable?
- Is the handling of relevant literature satisfactory?
- Are the form of presentation, the layout and the scientific apparatus satisfactory?
The report should give an overall impression of the work. In the presentation the positive aspects of the thesis should also be mentioned so that one also gains an impression of them. The conclusion, either positive og negative, should be formulated clearly and placed in the end of the document. The conclusion must be in compliance with the prior premises in the report.
Preparation of the recommendation
The recommendation must formally:
- have a heading/introduction stating which candidate it concerns and which department the candidate belongs to
- include information about the thesis
- title
- specify whether it is a monograph or an article-based thesis
- if the thesis is article-based, it must be evaluated on its scholarly quality regardless of whether the articles have been published ot not. The committee should briefly note each article’s publication stage.
- length (for example number of pages, number of chapters, or number of articles)
- include an unambiguous conclusion at the very end of the recommendation
- be dated
- be paginated
- if applicable: state in the introduction if the thesis has been submitted for a second time or has been submitted with revisions as suggested by the committee.
The report is to be sent to the Department's research coordinator, who forwards the documents to the Faculty.
Conclusion of the report
The report should end with a clear recommendation to the Faculty; whether the thesis is worthy of public defence or not. If the committee concludes that the thesis should not be approved for public defence, the report can make two alternative conclusions: not worthy of public defence, or recommending certain revisions in the thesis. The conclusion can therefore end in three possible conclusions:
- Worthy of public defence: In the presentation the positive aspects of the thesis should also be mentioned so that one also gains an impression of them.
- Not worthy of public defence. The candidate may submit the work for a second and final assessment no earlier than 6 months after the decision of the Tilsettingsutvalet for vitskapelege stillingar (TUV).
- Recommending minor revisions: If the thesis only has minor weaknesses, the committee can recommend the candidate to make a revision of the thesis before reaching a final conclusion. The committee should only recommend a revision if committee believes that a revision could give satisfactory results within a timeframe equal to 6 months of work or less. In such cases, the committee should provide clear guidelines regarding those areas in which the thesis should be strengthened (i.e. use of methodology, relationship between the material and conclusion, use of concepts, clarity of research question). The same committee will evaluate the revised thesis when it is resubmitted, and deliver a final report within a deadline of one month. Recommending minor revisions is only possible for PhD, not dr.Philos.
Trial lecture(s)
All candidates shall give a trial lecture on a topic laid down by the committee. The topic is announced to the doctoral candidate 10 working days before the lecture. The theme should be taken from the subject area from which the candidate's doctoral degree work originates, but not from the most central problematic issues. Candidates for the Degree of Dr. Philos. shall in addition give a lecture on a topic they have chosen themselves.
The purpose of the trial lecture(s) is that the candidate shall provide evidence of an ability to convey research-based knowledge. In the evaluation of the trial lecture both the academic content and the ability to communicate shall be emphasised. The level of this lecture shall be such that it is suited to the students at the Faculty.
The trial lecture must be passed before the public defence may take place (see Regulations for the degree of Philosophiae Doctor §18.1).
Public defence
The public defence is presided over by the Head of department or by any such person as is appointed by the Head of department. Who are to be the first and second opponents is decided in the committee. The first opponent introduces the discussion and the second concludes the defence. The opponents should have agreed in advance which problem areas each of them is to take up.
The public defence shall be an academic discussion between opponents and doctoral candidate concerning formulations of problems, methodological and theoretical basis, documentation and form of presentation. Special weight should be attached to testing to what extent important conclusions that the doctoral candidate has drawn in his or her work are in fact tenable. The problematic issues that the opponents choose to pursue need not be limited to those that are mentioned in the committee report. It is important that the opponents should also bring out the positive aspects of the thesis in their opposition. The form of the discussion should, in so far as this is possible, be of such a nature that those who have not read the thesis and do not know the subject field intimately are able to follow the discussion.
The candidate must pass both the trial lecture and the public defence before the degree and diploma can be conferred.