Exam jury members: PhD Qualifying Exam Committee. Must be at least 5 members; at least 2 members must be outside of KU. Students must bring the Jury appointment forms to the GSSSH office after completed. Please see Ph.D. Milestones for details and jury appointment forms:

Students who fail the exam: May retake the exam within 6 months. Different jury may be appointed. Students who fail the second time will lose their stipend, housing aid and all other benefits and will be required to pay an annual tuition.

Passing the Qual exam: Students must bring the exam reports to GSSSH office after completed. Please see Ph.D. Milestones for details and forms.

!!! Students who do not take the Qual Exam by YÖK’s suggested term will have their scholarships put on hold. The funds will be released once the exam is completed !!!

THESIS MONITORING COMMITTEE:

One month after passing the qualification exam, students are required to form a thesis monitoring committee.

Please see Ph.D. Milestones for committee composition and appointment forms:

!!! Students who do not form the Thesis Monitoring Committee by YÖK’s suggested time-line will have their scholarships put on hold. The funds will be released once the committee  is formed for all the months that it was on hold!!!

 

DISSERTATION PROPOSAL:

When to propose?: Students are required to propose their thesis research three month after passing the qualification exam . All Thesis Monitoring Committee members must approve the proposal. If the student fails to propose their thesis by the suggested term, then the student must submit a petition to GSSSH with the approval of the advisor and the program coordinator.

Format of the thesis proposal: Consult your advisor about the format. It should be aligned with the advisor and the thesis committee’s requests.

Forms Required! Please see Ph.D. Milestones for committee for thesis proposal forms.

!!! Students who do not defend the Thesis Proposal  by the suggested time-line will have their scholarships put on hold. The funds will be released once the proposal is defended for the entire time that it was put on hold!!!

THESIS PROGRESS MEETINGS:

When ? After thesis proposal student must meet with the thesis monitoring committed every six months. All Thesis Monitoring Committee member must approve the progress If the student fails to meet with the committee members by the suggested term, then the student must submit a petition to GSSSH with the approval of the advisor and the program coordinator.

Forms Required. Please see Ph.D. Milestones for thesis progress forms.

!!! It is our students responsibility to schedule their monitoring committee meetings every six-months after the proposal is defended. Students who do not turn in their progress report to the GSSSH office will have a hold on their scholorships !!!

 

FORMAT OF THE DISSERTATION:

3 Articles:

At least two of three papers have to be empirical articles

One of the papers can be a book chapter or a review article

Student has to be the first author in at least two of these three papers

• The journal articles (at least two) are expected to be published in international peer-reviewed journals (ISI). By the time of dissertation defense, one of these articles with the student as the first author must be accepted for publication (could also be under “pending minor revision”).
• Three papers should be compiled into a single document (by reformatting the copy edited papers in a single form). An introduction and a discussion should be written. The first chapter should be the introduction and the last chapter should be the discussion of the dissertation.

 

Traditional format: Thesis can be written in a form of a book consisting of chapters. Although the number of chapters used is relative to the specific research project and to the course duration, a thesis organized into chapters would typically look like this:

 

COMPOSITION OF THE THESIS JURY:

Thesis jury is composed of Thesis Monitoring Committee + 2 members. Thesis jury must have 2 Member’s from another University. 2nd advisor may attend meetings. Jury must be appointed by the department and approved by the Graduate School. Members of this committee must be affiliated with a University or an Academic Institution and must at least hold an Assistant Professor Degree.

Forms Required! Please see Ph.D. Milestones for committee for thesis proposal forms:

FINALIZING THE DISSERTATION:

Final draft of the dissertation must be sent to the entire appointed Jury members by latest 2 weeks before the defense date.

Students must notify the Graduate School of their defense date and provide announcement information.

Forms Required! Please see Ph.D. Milestones for committee for thesis defense forms:

LEAVE OF ABSENCES:

Except for official holidays when the University is closed graduate students are expected to be on campus fulfilling their degree requirements. During summer months graduate students who are on scholarships can take paid vacation (max two weeks) upon the recommendation of their advisors and the program coordinator. Otherwise they all have to be on campus.

TA / RA DUTIES:  

PROCTORING:

All GSSSH students are expected to be present for proctoring exams (including make up and amnesty exams) of the courses they are assigned to. They may also be asked to proctor exams for courses, which they are not assigned to as TAs. These extra proctoring assignments would not exceed 4 per academic year. Proctoring assignment will be done centrally by the graduate office. Proctoring may be necessary on weekends, late evenings, or times outside of regular hours.

STUDENTS ADMITTED TO Ph.D WITH A BA DEGREE: 

Students with a BA degree only and students with a non-thesis MA degree will complete a “major paper” by the end of their 4th semester.
These students are expected to draft and conduct an empirical research that is related to their upcoming doctoral work latest by the end of their second academic year (4th semester). The PhD candidate will be fully responsible for conceptualizing research question that will contribute to the literature and will be primarily responsible for designing the empirical study under the guidance of the PhD supervisor and the PhD Monitoring Committee. The student should turn in a paper to be evaluated by the advisory board and present the research during the Brown Bag seminars.