Co-authorship policy

The bulk of the work submitted for dissertation credit must reflect the independent substantive intellectual contribution of the candidate.

Such work may be done in the context of a collaborative project or laboratory environment in which more than one person contributes, and for which the student is not the lead intellectual contributor.

It may be the case that one or more of the papers submitted as part of the dissertation are the joint or collaborative product of multiple authors. In such cases, the candidate must acknowledge all co-authors, and the contributions of each author must be made explicit in the dissertation.

These same principles apply to the work submitted by the student under prelim option B (the submittal and defense of a single paper, allowed only for those who entered prior to Fall 2020). In such cases where the work submitted for the preliminary exam is co-authored, the student’s committee shall be diligent in examining and establishing the independent intellectual contributions of the student.

Adopted by Humphrey School of Public Affairs faculty, May 2016