Submitting your thesis
At its meeting on 16th October 2007, Senate approved an amendment to the Research Degrees Senate Regulation (SR5) requiring that from the beginning of the 2008/9 academic session, all research students should provide the Library with an electronic version of their successful thesis. The only exceptions to this requirement are submissions for PhD by the Published Works route and submissions for higher doctorates.
Examination Process
The examination process remains unchanged. A minimum of three soft bound copies of the thesis should be submitted to the student’s principal supervisor. On successful completion of the examination process the Library should be provided with an electronic version of the thesis following the process outlined below.
Embargo Requests and Process
If applicable, the student’s principal supervisor sends a request to Registry for a thesis to be embargoed using the Publication of Thesis form. The Chair of the Sub-Committee for Postgraduate Research Degrees (SCPGRD) agrees/denies the embargo request, and Registry notifies the Library and the supervisor. The supervisor/student will also send notification of the approved embargo to the Library when submitting the electronic thesis.
On receiving an approved thesis embargo request from the student or their principal supervisor, the Library will place the CD/DVD in a secure location. The Library’s Copyright & Digital Resources Officer will liaise with the Research Support and Development Office about any embargoed theses. The embargoed thesis will remain in the secure location for the duration of the embargo, which may occasionally be extended. At the end of the embargo period, the thesis will be deposited into BURA, assuming that no request has been received for the embargo to be extended. It is the responsibility of the student or supervisor to gain approval from Registry for an extension of an embargo. They must also notify the Library in good time if an embargo extension has been approved.
Submission of an e-Thesis to the Library
The student or their principal supervisor will send the Library the following:
- Full text thesis on CD/DVD
- Signed Brunel University Research Archive (BURA) deposit agreement form Brunel University Research Archive (BURA) Thesis Deposit Agreement form
- Copy of student’s award letter
- Signed Publication of Thesis form. Publication of Thesis form
NB: Complete Part A for Non-Confidential Theses. Complete Part B for Confidential Theses including the signature of your Supervisor and Registar.
Specifications for the thesis and CD/DVD are as follows:
- The thesis should be the final version after any corrections have been made
- The thesis including any supplements should preferably be a single file on the CD/DVD
- The thesis may be written using any word processor
- The CD/DVD should be carefully labelled with the student’s name and thesis title, so it’s easily identifiable
- Memory sticks should not be used as their labelling would be difficult
Depositing in BURA
Before depositing a thesis in BURA, the Library will check for plagiarism and third party copyright using Turnitin software.
Assuming that the Turnitin check for plagiarism and third party copyright is satisfactory, the Library will deposit the thesis in BURA. Metadata will be entered using data in the thesis itself, together with five descriptive keywords or short phrases as supplied on the BURA deposit agreement form. The first and where applicable the second supervisors’ names will be included in the metadata.
Catalogue Entry and EThOS Harvesting
Following deposition in BURA, a record will be created in the Library’s catalogue, which will contain a link to the full thesis text in BURA. Also the theses will be harvested from BURA by the British Library for inclusion in their database of British universities theses, EThOS (Electronic Theses Online Service).
Contacts
The student or their principal supervisor should send or deliver their full text thesis CD/DVD and other required items (as listed above) to the Help Desk in the Library. Enquiries about the thesis delivery process should be directed to thesis@brunel.ac.uk .
