Dissertation Policies
In all areas of study, prospective candidates must write a doctoral dissertation and defend it in a final oral examination. PhD programs define and determine the parameters for the content of the dissertation; the Dean for Graduate Studies determines the formatting and publishing requirements for all dissertations in the school.
Dissertation Committee Membership
- All dissertation committees should have at least three faculty members.
- The student's principal advisor, who will guide the research and the preparation of the dissertation, will be a dissertation committee chair. Individual departments may opt to allow co-chairs.
- Two of the committee members must come from the student’s own department or program (one of the two should be a committee chair).
- At least one of the committee members must be tenured. This member does not need to be a chair.
- At least one of the committee members must come from another department or from outside the university.
- An emeritus faculty member at Brandeis may serve as one of the committee members from the student’s own department or, if this faculty member is emeritus in another department, the faculty member may serve as the outside reader. After retirement, an emeritus faculty member may serve on committees but not take on new chairships. They will not receive payment for this.
- Should an inside reader, already committed to a dissertation reading committee, leave Brandeis for an appointment at another institution, this faculty member may be given a courtesy appointment in the department at Brandeis so that they may continue to serve on the committee as an advisor. However, this faculty member with a courtesy appointment cannot serve as the dissertation chair as a chair must be a current member of the faculty in the student’s department.
- Normally, all members of the committee must hold a PhD degree, although the program chair, with approvals from the Dean of the student's school and the Dean for Graduate Studies, may waive the requirement when a potential committee member has demonstrated a capacity to do research or be helpful in supervising a dissertation. To request an exception to these requirements, the program should contact the Assistant Dean of Academic Affairs for Graduate Studies, who will then bring the request to the appropriate Deans.
Dissertation Defense
Dissertation defenses are required to be public and open to any member of the faculty engaged in graduate instruction and invited faculty members from other institutions. Students must submit the date and time of their defense to the Graduate Studies’ Dissertation Defense Calendar Submission Form at least two weeks prior to the scheduled defense. A student must be registered and enrolled in the term(s) in which the dissertation is defended and deposited. The student and the dissertation committee can determine the modality of the defense (in-person, hybrid, remote). There are not specific rules about how far in advance of the defense the final copy of the dissertation must be submitted to the committee, department faculty, or graduate studies staff.Dissertation Revisions
A dissertation committee can conclude the oral examination by:
- Passing the dissertation with no revisions
- Passing the dissertation with minor revisions
- Requiring substantial revisions
If the dissertation examining committee requires "substantial revisions" (involving significant matters of substance), the revisions must be reviewed and accepted by the entire committee, not just the dissertation supervisor. If these revisions are not made within six months of the dissertation defense, there must be a re-defense of the dissertation. If the dissertation examining committee requires "minor revisions" (e.g., stylistic changes, correction of typographical errors and re-formatting), the committee will indicate on the Defense Form whether the revisions may be reviewed and approved by the dissertation committee chair alone or require the full committee's approval. If these revisions are not made within three months of the dissertation defense, the dissertation is automatically reclassified as one requiring "substantial revisions" and subject to its six-month deadline (i.e., if after an additional three months the dissertation has not been approved by the committee and successfully deposited, there must be a re-defense).
Dissertation Submission and Publication
For information about the dissertation submission process, visit the Thesis and Dissertation Guide. No later than the dates specified for dissertation deposit in the current academic calendar for February, May, and August degrees, the candidate must electronically deposit one copy of the finished dissertation. The dissertation must have the signed approval of the dissertation supervisor and readers, and it must comply with the publishing and formatting guidelines outlined by the office of Graduate Studies which may be different from department guidelines. Submission of the dissertation to and acceptance by Graduate Studies constitutes the completion of degree requirements.
Submitted dissertations are published electronically in the ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Database. In addition to publication in ProQuest, students’ dissertations are published in the Brandeis ScholarWorks once degrees are conferred. Dissertations published in ScholarWorks will be made available to the academic community through Open Access.
Detailed instructions for submitting dissertations are available from the Graduate Studies office or this website under the Students section.