Dissertation and Thesis Information

Procedure for the Composition of Dissertation and Thesis Committees

Committee

The thesis or dissertation committee is composed of three or more members of the graduate faculty. The committee is responsible for approving the quality of the scholarly work, adherence to the particular style manual, and the quality of grammar, syntax, spelling, and punctuation used in the thesis or dissertation. The student should seek departmental approval of the thesis, including its format, as early as possible to allow ample time for revision. Students whose manuscripts require editing are encouraged to seek professional editorial assistance.

Committee Selection and Composition

Graduate faculty members in each program in which a thesis or dissertation is part of the degree program will develop guidelines for the selection of a thesis or dissertation advisor and the composition of the thesis or dissertation committee for that program. The guidelines will be submitted to the Graduate Studies Committee for review. The results of advisor and committee selection for a given student will be reported to the Dean of the College of Graduate Studies on the Intent to produce a Thesis or Dissertation form.

The following Thesis/Dissertation Committee guidelines were created by student and faculty committees and approved by Graduate Council to assist in establishing expectations.

The following Thesis/Dissertation Advisor guidelines were created by student and faculty committees and approved by Graduate Council to assist in establishing expectations.

Dissertation and Thesis Procedure

This document addresses general dissertation and thesis approval procedures.

Please see below for the chronological procedure to have your dissertation/thesis approved and finalized:

1. The defense should be open to the community and announced in advance.
2. Approval of the written thesis/dissertation by your committee following the successful defense.
3. All theses and dissertations are required to be assessed for originality and proper citation of resources utilized. The Originality of Thesis/Dissertation Verification form must accompany the final document submitted to the College of Graduate Studies via email to ajurmsonjeffries. (The Originality form should NOT be part of your final pdf, but rather a separate document.) Dissertation and Thesis advisors can request access to iThenticate by contacting Dr. Severine Van Slambrouck (svanslambrouck@ysu.edu).
4. Submit the following to the College of Graduate Studies. (Paper submissions will not be accepted starting spring of 2020.)
   • A pdf of your complete/final document using the page numbering and margin guidelines below.
   • The signature should include committee members typed names but not signatures.  Approval will be assessed via email. (The signature page should be page number 2 of your pdf.)
   • Please be sure to include IRB approval or waiver in the appendix of your thesis, if your research necessitates.
   • The Originality of Thesis/Dissertation Verification form with digital signatures. (The Originality form should NOT be part of your final pdf, but rather a separate document.)
   • The ETD submission form with digital signature. (The ETD submission form should NOT be part of your final pdf, but rather a separate document.)
5. Once Dean Sanders’s final approval has been granted, Angie will email you the document with all digital signatures and the link to complete the upload of your document to Ohiolink.
6. We have discontinued the binding requirement for theses/dissertations. If you wish to have a personal copy bound there are many companies online to this. The following website is one option: http://acmebinding.com/thesis-binding/

Dissertation and Thesis Style Manual

You should follow the style manual accepted by your department. Any questions regarding style will be forwarded to your thesis committee chair.

Follow the style manual used by your field, as determined by your department, when writing a thesis.

Title, Signature, and Abstract Pages
The title page, the signature page, optional copyright page, and the one-page abstract must conform to the attached examples. If you would like to include a personal message, you may do so on a separate page, after these three/four pages and before the body of the thesis.

Margins and Page Numbering
Margins are 1" on the top, bottom, right-hand side, and left-hand side. The body of the thesis begins with page number 1. Pages prior to page 1 are numbered with Roman numerals. The first page numbered is the abstract (page iii); the title and signature pages are not numbered.

Human Subjects/Animal Subjects
If use of human/animal subjects was involved in your research, include documentation of approval or waiver received from the YSU Human Subjects Research Committee in the appendix of your document 

ITHENTICATE RESOURCES

Deadlines for Dissertation and Thesis Submission 

It is the responsibility of the student and the student's advisor and committee to make arrangements to complete the dissertation/thesis, including the defense and edits, by the deadline. The student should seek departmental approval of the dissertation/thesis, including format, at an early date to allow ample time for revisions.

Fall and Spring semesters: Dissertations submitted by the Monday of 14th week of the term. Theses submitted by the Monday of the 15th week of term. 
Summer semester: Dissertations submitted by the Monday of the 11th week of the full term. Theses submitted by the 12th week of the full term.

Electronic Thesis/Dissertation (ETD) Submission Guidelines

ETD Info Sessions:

We will not hold face to face ETD sessions.  Please see the following resources and email contact Angie Urmson Jeffries at ajurmsonjeffries@ysu.edu with any questions.

Adobe Signature Training

Introduction and Contacts:

This document contains guidelines for formatting and submitting your thesis or dissertation to the OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations (ETD) Center. As a participant in OhioLINK’s ETD program, Youngstown State University releases all master’s theses and doctoral dissertations to the ETD Center for online access. The benefits of the ETD program include open access to your thesis or dissertation and open access to the knowledge produced by the YSU academic community. 

Questions or concerns about ETD submission or any aspect of the ETD program should be addressed to: 
Angie Urmson Jeffries 
Senior Coordinator, Graduate Administrative Affairs 
College of Graduate Studies 
etdadmin@ysu.edu
330.941.7252 

Kevin Whitfield
Catalog Librarian
Maag Library
etdadmin@ysu.edu
330.941.2922

The ETD Process 

The submission of your faculty approved ETD will take place after you have successfully defended your thesis or dissertation.  

Release of your ETD to the OhioLINK ETD Center can be considered as prior publication. If you are using the content of your thesis or dissertation toward another pending publication or patent, you may request a publication delay. The Publication Delay Request form should be submitted with the required submission items.

Steps of the ETD process 

Step 1 - After the Dean of the Graduate College reviews your thesis/dissertation, please make any revisions necessary.

Check the formatting of your faculty approved original document so that it is in compliance with the examples and guidelines of the Thesis Procedure or Dissertation Procedure documents. For example: 

• Title page is formatted as per the example
• Signature page is included without student and faculty signatures
• Copyright page is formatted as per the example
• Pages are appropriately numbered
• Margins are properly formatted and consistent throughout
• Fonts are consistent throughout
• If applicable, the IRB letter is included-without signature.

Once revisions required by the Dean of the Graduate College have been made and proper formatting of the original document has been confirmed, convert your file to PDF format. 

Step 2 - Converting your MS Word file to PDF Format 

For assistance with PDF conversion, call an ETD Program representative.

Some students create their theses and dissertations in multiple files for later assembly as a print document. If you choose to assemble files with different page numbering in MS Word, retaining correct formatting of page numbering can be difficult. In order to preserve the original page numbering format, it is advisable that you convert each file to PDF separately and assemble the document in Adobe Acrobat Professional following conversion.

Following conversion, perform an overview of each page of your PDF document for possible corruption of data, paying particular attention to:

• Formulae
• Data in statistical tables 

Re-convert the original document to PDF if errors in the conversion appear.

Submit the word document and the converted PDF on a flash drive with the required submission items.

The College of Graduate Studies will perform an examination of the submitted PDF document to ensure compliance with the formatting guidelines of the Thesis or Dissertation Procedure documents in addition to establishing a match with your print copy.

Be advised that the responsibility of checking the thesis or dissertation upon conversion to PDF format rests primarily with the student.

Upon approval of the submitted PDF file, the College of Graduate Studies will apply an electronic signature to your document identifying it as approved. You will receive by e-mail:

• Your electronically signed PDF document
• The link to the OhioLINK ETD Center’s submission tool. 

In rare cases where the file is too large for e-mail attachment, you will be asked to come to the College of Graduate Studies to retrieve the file. Bring a flash drive to carry the approved file.

Step 3 - Uploading your Document to the OhioLINK ETD Center (After you receive the email instructing you to do so)

• Go to the OhioLINK website for electronic submission, and follow the steps to submit the “complete, finalized ETD.” https://www.oh-tech.org/dba/ohiolink_maintenance
• Select the option for: “I am submitting: My paper’s bibliographic information, abstract, and full text.”
• Read the terms and click on the box to agree and continue.
• Select the school: Youngstown State University. Then click on the button “Paper Information.”
• Complete “Information about your Paper” and click on the box to save and continue.
• Enter name using last name then first name. Do not use all caps.
• Enter your title. Do not use all caps.
• Enter all of the information on this page before continuing.  Note: OhioLINK allows you to select subject headings and keywords relating to your document. The Graduate College highly recommends that you utilize these options. Entering keywords will allow people to find your document via search engines without requiring that they know your complete title.  
• Complete “Degree Information” and click on the box to save and continue. Note: Complete the section for “Your Advisors/Committee Members”.
• Enter as last name, first name of members.  Confirm each members terminal degree for the suffix field
• Complete “Publication Information” and click on the box to save and continue.
• OhioLINK Permissions: we recommend keeping the default of “Copyright, all rights reserved.” You may select one of the other options, but please read the links carefully before selecting one of those options.
• Publication Delay: May be selected if previously approved via the Publication Delay Form.
• UMI Publication: UMI Publication is mandatory for doctoral dissertations.  UMI Publication is option for thesis students.
• Complete “Upload Documents” by clicking the “Browse” button, selecting your pdf file, and clicking the “Upload Now” button.
• “Review and Complete Submission” and select “NO - Return to Editing” if there are errors or “YES – Submit My ETD Now” if everything is correct. Note: Your paper is not submitted until you click on the “YES – Submit My ETD Now” button.
• A page will appear stating, “Submission Complete.”
• Students will be sent an email confirmation from OhioLINK that the document was received and another once the Graduate College has approved.

Thesis/Dissertation Errata Procedure 

Students and advisors should check content carefully before submission to avoid errors. On occasion, however, significant errors in content are discovered after submission to the Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center of Ohiolink.  For submission of errata, the error must be considered significant. Minor errors, such as typographical or other mistakes that do not impede comprehension, are not formally corrected.  

To request the inclusion of an Errata Statement to the original submission, please submit the following to the Graduate College: 

• Name:  
• Title of Thesis/Dissertation:
• Accession Number:
• Date thesis/dissertation submitted (Month, Year):
• Attach a PDF of the errata data 

Academic Integrity

Violations of academic integrity (including plagiarism, fabrication of data, etc.) will be addressed following the Academic Integrity Process. Link to: https://ysu.edu/student-conduct/academic-integrity-process 

Three Minute Thesis