Milestone 5: The Dissertation and its Defense

The dissertation is the final assessment of doctoral students before they are conferred their degree. All students who are in the dissertation stage are officially considered “Doctoral Candidates” by the University of Minnesota. Completion of a dissertation requires the identification of research questions, a comprehensive review of literature, design of a study, data collection, analysis of data, reporting of findings, and discussion of implications. Students should work closely with their advisors during the dissertation stage and receive guidance on programmatic and disciplinary norms for this project. The advisor, in consultation with the student, will provide information on when the dissertation is ready for full review from the committee. A completed dissertation is one that demonstrates the highest levels of mastery and expertise in a discipline, which allows for the conferral of the Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.) degree.

Preparation for the Final Oral Defense signals the end of the student’s doctoral study journey. Upon approval from their advisor, students may begin preparing for their Final Oral Examination during the dissertation writing or revision process. Similar to the Milestone 3: Oral Preliminary Examination, all committee members must be present at an Oral Examination. These events can be held on campus or virtually. Because a portion of the Final Oral Examination is open to the public, please complete this form when the date, time, and location is set. Students should work with the Chair of their Final Oral Examination to create Zoom links for their final defense and to share them with committee members. Feel free to contact OLPD communications at olpd@umn.edu if you want help with this, as well. For on-campus Examinations, please contact Savannah Greaves (greav022@umn.edu) or the OLPD front desk in Burton Hall for help with scheduling meeting rooms for this event. Examinations require a two-hour block of time. Students frequently use an electronic scheduling tool or use faculty UMN Google calendars to check committee availability. Friends and family may be invited to the public portion of the Final Oral Defense.

In addition to setting a date for the Final Oral Examination with their committee, students are responsible for registering their Final Oral Examination with the University of Minnesota’s Graduate School. The first step in this registration is to declare their examination date at least a week before the exam. Second, students should apply to graduate at the latest by the first day of the month they wish to graduate. Students should confer with their advisor about anticipated graduation timelines, as revisions are nearly always expected on dissertations before being considered “final.” Finally, students will need to launch an electronic Reviewers’ Report that will be used in the Final Oral Examination as well as schedule their final oral exam through the University’s Graduate School. Hyperlinks to both the  final exam reviewers’ form and final defense scheduler can be found at the Graduate School’s  Degree Completion Steps page.

The above-mentioned “Reviewers Report” serves an important function for the student and the university. In order to proceed to the Final Oral Examination (Doctoral Defense), all of the reviewers must indicate that the thesis is "acceptable for final defense" or is "acceptable with minor revisions." If any reviewer indicates that the thesis is "unacceptable for defense and requires major revisions," the reviewer must inform the student in writing of the revisions required. Such revisions must be adequately addressed prior to the scheduled defense, or the defense must be rescheduled to a later time.

Scheduling of the Final Oral Examination will trigger checks on the student's file to confirm that the student is eligible to proceed. Some checks will occur instantly while others will occur closer the actual exam date.

To be eligible for the final oral examination, the student must have: 

• satisfactorily completed all work as required on the GPAS form

• passed both the written and oral preliminary examinations,

• maintained active status by registering for classes or credits,

• satisfied the thesis-credit requirement,

• had all assigned readers approve the Reviewers' Report Form, and

• completed all necessary requirements and steps so that the degree can be awarded within the time limit for degree completion (eight years from entry into the program).

The Final Oral Examination (Doctoral Defense) is chaired by a committee member other than the advisor. All committee members must be present for the Oral Examination to take place. In very rare circumstances, if a committee member is unable to participate in the exam on the day it is scheduled, the student may reschedule the exam or attempt to make a committee substitution. Should such a circumstance arise, the student should immediately contact the faculty advisor (or the Coordinator of Graduate Studies, if the advisor is the person unable to attend) to discuss possible options for finding an appropriate substitute committee member on short notice. If a substitute committee member cannot be found on short notice, then the exam will need to be postponed. If a substitute committee member is found and approved by the Coordinator of Graduate Studies, the student will need to revise the preliminary examination committee to reflect the change before the start of the examination or immediately thereafter.

No refreshments are necessary or expected at the defense. If, however, the student chooses to bring refreshments for the committee and/or guests, the relevant guidelines indicated for the Oral Preliminary Examination should be followed: 

• Refreshments should be limited to Preliminary Oral Examination and Final Oral Defenses only.

• Students should limit refreshments to a single beverage and snack item for the student, external guests, and committee members.

The Final Oral Examination takes place in three parts. These are listed below.

• Part 1: Public Presentation – Doctoral defense public presentations in OLPD are open to the public. During this part of the Final Oral Examination, students present their dissertation research for about 20-25 minutes and engage in a brief question-and-answer period during which the student responds to questions from the public. Students may invite friends, family members, and colleagues to this portion of the Final Oral Examination.

• Part 2: Closed Meeting – Upon completion of  Public Presentation , guests and attendees will be asked to leave the physical or virtual space in which the Final Oral Examination takes place. Part 2 is a closed meeting between the candidate and the examining committee during which committee members ask the candidate questions about the dissertation and related areas. Part 2 typically begin with the committee asking the student to temporarily leave the room for a short committee-only meeting in which the Chair review processes and procedures for the Exam itself with committee members. The student is then brought back into the room and the examination begins.

• Part 3: Voting and Discussion – When all committee members have completed their questioning of the Doctoral Candidate, the student is again asked to leave the room and a private meeting is held to discuss feedback to be given concluding with vote taken on the Exam outcome by the committee members in accordance with Graduate School procedures. The two options for committee members are “Pass” or “Fail.” After voting is completed, the Chair will enter the final assessment into an electronic form that is launched after the student scheduled their defense date. Regardless of the final decision, the student will be called back in amd committee members will return to meet with the Doctoral Candidate and share feedback and recommendations for revisions of the final dissertation. Students will receive a copy of the committee assessment form within 24 hours of their defense via email.

If the committee’s evaluation is “Pass” (as determined by majority vote), the committee will make recommendations for revisions. If revisions are minor, the committee may assign final reviews of the dissertation to the advisor. If revision recommendations are more substantive, committee members may ask to review the final dissertation before submission to the Graduate School. There is no provision for retakes if the committee evaluation is “Fail.” 

As noted above, revision requests are common in Final Oral Examinations. Although the student wrote a sufficient dissertation to “Pass,” the final dissertation often requires updates. Adhering to the advice of the committee is important, as the final dissertation will be publicly available once it is submitted to the Graduate School. Revision time periods are at the discretion of the advisor and Doctoral Candidate but must be completed on the last work day within the time specified in the student’s specified graduation month. If revisions exceed this time period, a new application to graduate in a future month will be required.

Students can visit the University of Minnesota’s Graduate School Degree Completion Steps document at any time for abbreviated explanations of this and all degree steps.