You will have received guidance during the latter stages of the programme on aspects of the dissertation, and from your supervisor as you have undertaken your research. Dissertations can take a variety of forms but, whatever form yours takes, you should ensure that it has a clear structure which is easy for your readers to understand and follow. The outline below
shows a fairly traditional format which many students choose to use and which is a reliable structure to work within if you have not developed an alternative with your supervisor. (Refer also to other materials and guidance specific to your particular programme and study.)
Whatever format you choose, you MUST provide an abstract on a separate page before the introduction. This is not an alternative to the introduction. Its purpose is to inform the reader about the main argument or theme of the dissertation and to give some indication of its context and conclusions.
In this first chapter you should set out your research question/s, justify it/them and explain the context for the dissertation.
In this chapter, you should discuss the literature relating to your research question/s. You should not, however, treat this chapter as the sole place where you will refer to the literature. Where relevant, you should be referring to the literature and relating it to what you are doing or what you are discussing at any particular point.
Here you should outline your methodology, and discuss the methods you chose and why. You should also highlight any problems you encountered, and provide any insights related to the implementation of the research. In order to support your choice of approach and methods, you should refer to a selection of appropriate texts on research methods and methodology, including, where appropriate, materials supplied as part of the Research Methods module earlier in the programme.
Here you explain how you made sense of your data (i.e. explain your strategies for analysis) and present your findings, including relating them to the literature. This may be done over one or more chapters.
In this chapter you should restate your research question/s and summarise your main findings and argument, including the limitations of the study. You can also make suggestions for future research or provide ideas as to how the research might be taken forward, either generally or/and within a particular institution.
List all those works cited in the text of your dissertation. The School of Education accepts ‘author-date’ systems of referencing. These include Harvard, APA and Chicago. Detailed guidance can be found in the School of Education Referencing Guide which is available on MOLE.
It is good practice in academic writing to keep your work as precise as possible, and to write within the given word limits. No less so than with your dissertation! Your dissertation must be between a minimum of 15,000 words and maximum of 20,000 words in length. (Unless you are specifically told otherwise, your word count should include footnotes, but exclude title, abstract, bibliography and appendices.) If the dissertation is beyond this it will be given a fail grade and this may delay a final decision on the award of your degree. If the dissertation achieves a pass grade on resubmission, it cannot be awarded more than a mark of 50. You will need to pay a resubmission charge. As this fee changes each year, this information will be supplied on application. Reference lists, appendices and additional materials are not to be included in the word count.
Appendix 6 provides a checklist for evaluating your dissertation before submission.
Do not wait until you are near the submission date before you ask for advice from your supervisor. Keep in close touch from the outset and, whatever structure you choose to adopt in presenting your dissertation, review it with you supervisor at every stage. Check with your supervisor when s/he may be away from the University so that you can plan this into your own timetable for completion.