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Wednesday, July 16, 2008

Ph. D thesis quality: the views of the examiners - S Bourke

The Ph. D is clearly the pinnacle of formal education qualifications internationally, representing excellence and attracting resources and prestige to universities. In Australia, normally the only assessment of the Ph.D. is the reports on the thesis by two or three external examiners. The examiners effectively set Ph.D. standards. This study provides empirical information on doctoral assessment. From 2121 examiner reports on 804 thesis across all discipline areas at eight Australian universities, discipline and other differences, and thesis quality are discussed. What examiners comment on, and therefore presumably value, should be of considerable use to candidates and supervisors in meeting examiner expectations. Because examiner recommendations are intended for another specific purpose, there are problems in identifying thesis quality directly from them, except in distinguishing between the best and the marginal thesis. However, more fine-grained distinctions between theses would seem to be possible from a detailed description of the written comments.
From: SAJHE 21 (8) 2007

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