Statement of Review Policy

A Student Guide To

Preparing Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The manuscript prepared by each student should be

fully proofread and corrected BEFORE submission online to the Graduate School. It is the primary responsibility of the thesis or dissertation committee and the student for reviewing and proofing the document before submission.

As part of the submission the committee and the student must sign and certify that the electronic copy of the manuscript is a true copy of the final approved version and that it has been fully proofed and reviewed. You and your committee chairperson must sign a Committee Acceptance Form for Electronic Thesis or Dissertation and forward it to the Graduate School; your thesis or dissertation cannot be accepted unless this form has been submitted.

The Graduate School then conducts a final editorial review of each master’s thesis or doctoral dissertation to ensure that the general requirements of this manual and the student’s style guide have been met. However, the primary responsibility for reviewing a thesis or dissertation has always belonged to the student and the thesis or dissertation committee.

The Graduate School’s review focuses on grammar and format rather than the scholarly content, which is the responsibility of the student and committee.

The Graduate School reviews the following key areas:

organization of the pages - preliminaries are all present and in the correct order;
format - print font, margins, and page numbering are all correct;
grammar and spelling - the Graduate School will review the manuscript for spelling errors and to ensure that the sentences and use of English are grammatically correct;
references - bibliographies will be reviewed to ensure that all references and quotations are included and correctly formatted;
abstract - this will be read to ensure that it satisfies the Graduate School requirements for length and content;
table of contents, list of figures, list of tables - these will be reviewed to ensure that wording is consistent between table/list and main body of the manuscript; and
publishing agreement and survey of earned doctorates- the Graduate School will ensure that all necessary forms have been completed and signed.

If, in reviewing a manuscript, the Graduate School determines that major corrections must be made, the thesis or dissertation will be rejected for a more thorough editing and proofing by the student and the committee chair. Thereafter, a changed pdf must be re-submitted using the online electronic submission process.