THESIS REGULATIONS: FULFILMENT AND EVALUATION OF THE FINAL EXAMINATION
Class LM-42 of Master’s Degrees – single-cycle D.M. 270/2004
Class 47/S of Specialised Degrees – Ministerial Decree 509/1999
In accordance with the Didactic Regulations, the dissertation is assessed as part of the final examination.
The Thesis, consisting of original work by the student, may be compilatory o experimental.
Dissertation topics may be interdisciplinary in nature.
1) FIGURES INVOLVED
1.1 – Student.The student must comply with the requirements of these regulations regarding the preparation and discussion of the Degree Thesis. He/she shall submit a dissertation application at least 8 months prior to the graduation call, fulfilling the administrative obligations, as stipulated on this subject in Section 2, subsection 2.1.
1.2 – Relatore e Correlatore.The Thesis Advisor is a figure chosen by the student from among the teaching staff of the University of Pisa and communicated to the President of the Degree Course Council, indicating his/her name and position in the Thesis application, which specifies the subject on which the work will focus. For the preparation of the thesis, the supervisor and the student may avail themselves of the services of a co-rapporteur, whose name shall be indicated in the thesis application; the co-rapporteur may come from another university, including a foreign one, or may be a professional figure from outside the University, who may also hold a degree of another nationality. In the event that the Co-Rapporteur is a professional figure from outside the University, and has never acted as Co-Rapporteur at the Degree Course in Veterinary Medicine, a teaching/scientific curriculum vitae of the indicated Co-Rapporteur must be attached to the thesis application.
The specific task of the Rapporteur and Co-Rapporteur is to coordinate the Thesis work: on the day of the final examination, the Rapporteur and the Co-Rapporteur, if any, give an assessment of the student’s work in preparing the Thesis (commitment, ability to work independently and critical capacity).
1.3 – Controrelatore.He is a figure identified within the teaching staff of the Department of Veterinary Sciences.
The Rapporteur in the Thesis application must indicate the names of 1-2 Co-Rapporteurs, who may or may not belong to the same Disciplinary Scientific Sector (SSD) as the Rapporteur and/or Co-Rapporteur;
The Counter-Rapporteur contributes through active discussion with the Student and the Supervisor and/or Co-Rapporteur to the development and preparation of the Thesis. At the time of the final examination, after the presentation of the Thesis work by the Candidate, the Counter-Rapporteur expresses his/her judgement on the activity carried out by the Student.
2) OPERATIONAL MODES
2.1 – Presentazione domanda di Tesi.The Thesis application must be submitted at least 8 months before the Degree call, and the student must have previously acquired 180 CFU and taken the ‘Computer Science’ and ‘European Community Foreign Language’ examinations. The student must submit the thesis application to the Department of Veterinary Sciences using the forms available on the Degree Course website: the application must indicate the generic thesis topic, the SSD within which the thesis will be developed, the Supervisor, the Co-Rapporteur (if any) and they must indicate 1-2 Counter-Rapporteurs.
Within the Degree Course Council, together with the approval of the topic of the Thesis, the Rapporteur and the Co-Rapporteur (if any), the Counter-Rapporteur shall be appointed from among the names suggested, or others proposed and/or identified by the Council, in relation to the specific topic of the Thesis, in accordance with the implementation rules indicated above. The Didactic Unit of the Department of Veterinary Sciences shall notify the appointed Counter-Rapporteurs.
2.2 – Riunione figure coinvolte.Within 4 months of the Thesis application date, the Rapporteur shall convene the Student, the Co-Rapporteur (if any) and the Counter-Rapporteur to discuss the progress of the Thesis work; one month before the Graduation Appeal, he/she shall convene a further meeting of the figures involved to assess the Thesis work.
2.3 –Thesis Architecture. The Thesis must contain, on the first page, the title in Italian and in English, a summary in Italian and in English, followed by 5 ‘key-words’, both in Italian and in English. The student is given the opportunity to write the thesis in English or in another language, provided that the Supervisor, the Co-Rapporteur and the Counter-Rapporteur, if any, express a favourable opinion: the student must make a request to the Degree Course Council, attaching the declaration of the Supervisors and the Counter-Rapporteur. The thesis shall be discussed in Italian.
2.4 – Electronic theses. The Thesis must be submitted exclusively in electronic format (ETD), in accordance with the rules laid down in the relevant University Regulations, and published on the website http://etd.adm.unipi.it/
2.5 – Thesis Approval. At least 15 days before the date set for the roll call (15 effective days, not working days) the student must deliver to the University Student Secretariat, together with the university booklet, the electronic title page of the thesis also signed by the Advisor. He/she must also deliver the completed logbook to the Degree Course Chairperson.
When the Supervisor is asked to sign the electronic title page, the thesis must already have taken on a definitive form or, in any case, be considered suitable for discussion in the degree session. It is advisable, therefore, that the student, at the same time as the signature is obtained from the Supervisor, presents his or her work to the Supervisor, so that the latter can check its content.
At least 15 days prior to the date set for the degree call, the student must deliver to the Department of Veterinary Science’s Teaching Unit a self-certification (signed by the candidate, the lecturers and the counter- lecturer) stating that the title of the thesis complies with the thesis topic approved by the Degree Course Council (forms on the Degree Course website).
Two days before the graduation session, the student must deliver a hard copy of the thesis to the Department of Veterinary Sciences’ Teaching Unit, for use in the Department’s Central Library.
2.6 – Change of Topic, Rapporteur, Correlator and Thesis Counterpart. Any change in the topic of the Thesis or of the Lecturers involved must be promptly communicated to the President of the Degree Course for the activation of the appropriate procedures within the Degree Course Council.
In the event of the inability of the Rapporteur or Co-Rapporteur to be present on the day of the final examination, they must notify the Degree Course Chairperson in good time: it is not necessary to replace them as long as at least one of the Rapporteurs is present.
Should the Counter-Rapporteur be unable to be present on the day of the Thesis, he/she shall promptly notify the Supervisor and the Degree Course Chairperson, who shall arrange, by means of a Board resolution or by means of an Emergency Measure, for the replacement of the Counter-Rapporteur with the second name possibly indicated in the Thesis application or with another person indicated by the Supervisor and/or possibly deemed suitable by the Degree Course Council.
3) PROCEDURE FOR THE FINAL EXAMINATION
3.1 – The Chairman of the Final Examination Committee is normally identified as the President of the Degree Course, who may be replaced by another Lecturer appointed by the Director on the proposal of the President of the Degree Course.
3.2 – In individual Degree Sessions, the need for several Commissions may be identified.
3.3 – The number of Degree Appeals scheduled in the calendar year, according to the University Teaching Regulations, is identified as a minimum of 6 and a maximum of 9.
3.4 – The thesis presentation must be completed within a maximum of 15 minutes.
3.5 – The discussion, with questions addressed to the Student, must last no longer than 10 minutes.
3.6 – The time allotted for presentation and discussion shall be the same for all candidates and all Degree Sessions, regardless of the number of candidates.
4) FORMULATION OF THE FINAL EXAMINATION GRADE AND GRADUATION GRADE
The graduation mark is the sum of the two marks resulting from the following steps:
STEP 1. Thesis evaluation:
The criteria to be taken into account by the commissioners of the degree session when awarding the mark for the final examination are:
- a) Judgements made by the Supervisor, the Co-Rapporteur and the Counter-Rapporteur, if any, on the Student’s activity during the preparation of the Thesis.
- (b) Scientific validity of the work.
- (c) Expository capacity.
- d) Quality of exhibition support material.
- e) Ability to respect exposure times.
The members of the Commission cast their votes, which will be between 0 and 12.
The grade for the final examination is the arithmetic mean of the marks awarded.
STAGE 2. Evaluation of the candidate’s career up to the time of submission of the final examination.
- Grade average – The Board takes note of the overall marks that the student has acquired during his or her career and which result from the printouts provided by the Student secretariat.For students enrolled in the academic year 2013-14 and subsequent years, the calculation of the average of the marks obtained in the examinations is obtained from the average of the marks obtained in the individual examinations, weighted with respect to the weight in CFUs of the same; for those enrolled in previous academic years, both the arithmetic average (as envisaged by the previous Academic Regulations) and the weighted average will be calculated, and the most favourable will be chosen.
- Career — The President of the Final Examination Committee, before awarding the degree mark, presents the Candidate’s study career to the Committee, highlighting particular conditions of merit, especially in relation to the duration of the university course.
The final degree mark is derived from the sum of the scores from STEP 1 and STEP 2. The maximum mark that can be awarded is 110/110. In the event that the maximum mark is reached, the Commission, on the proposal of the President, may award honours, exclusively by unanimous vote.
5) END-OF-COURSE QUESTIONNAIRE
Each graduating student is required to complete an end-of-course statistical questionnaire drawn up by the ‘AlmaLaurea’ Inter-University Consortium with the aim of collecting evaluations and judgments regarding the university experience, monitoring students’ study pathways and improving the educational offer. This questionnaire therefore represents a useful element in the evaluation of the study path, since the National Committee for the Evaluation of the University System and the MIUR periodically require the University to deliver documents containing information on the performance of graduates.
When submitting the ETD cover page to the University Student Secretariat, the student must hand in a print-out of the receipt certifying that the AlmaLaurea questionnaire has been completed.
6) ADDITIONAL RULES
The final examination must preferably be held in the Aula Magna of the Department and the Members of the Commission, if they are not provided with robes by the Central Administration, must attend in suitable attire for the occasion.
When compiling the degree report, the code of the President of the Final Examination Committee must be entered in the ‘Teacher Code’ field.
Approved by resolution No. 10 of the Board of Veterinary Medicine of 14/12/2017