For Thesis Reviewers

There are two important parts to the departmental approval process: content approval and format approval. By signing the Thesis/Dissertation Approval (TDA) form the master’s adviser or doctoral committee indicates content approval of the thesis or dissertation. Submission of the TDA indicates that the thesis format has been reviewed and approved by the assigned thesis format reviewer for the student’s program.

You may be thinking of the Final Exam Result (FER) form, which indicates the result of the doctoral final examination. A doctoral student may have passed the final exam on the condition that further revisions to the dissertation be completed prior to deposit. The TDA form indicates that the committee has determined the dissertation is ready for deposit.

There are two versions of the TDA form: one for master’s students and one for doctoral students. Because Graduate College policy requires a master’s thesis to be approved by a graduate faculty member, at least one of the signatures in the Adviser Approval or Additional Approval sections of a master’s TDA form must be that of a graduate faculty member. On the doctoral TDA form, the student’s director of research (adviser) and all committee members who voted to pass the student at the final exam (defense) are required to sign. All TDA forms must be signed by the department head or director of graduate studies.

Signatures of advisers or committee members may be obtained by faxing or scanning and emailing the form for the off-campus individual to sign (signatures must be hand-written) and return. All signatures must be on the same form.

TDA and doctoral examination result (PER/FER) forms submitted as scanned copies by authorized departmental faculty or staff via the appropriate secured link on the Graduate College website do not require original (wet-ink) signatures.

The director of graduate studies may also sign the TDA form. Consult the GC Roles & Access Manager for your department or program.

Yes, the student's name on the title page should match the official version of their name in Banner. If the student has a preferred name listed in Banner, this may be used instead of the official version of their name. 

The degree and program names may be found by entering the student's UIN into SGASTDN (in Banner). After clicking the "Next Block" button, the degree name appears in "Curricula Summary - Primary" under the heading "Degree". The program name appears in "Field of Study Summary" under the heading "Field of Study". Click here to see the degree and program location on the SGASTDN screen.

After the student has made ALL revisions and corrections and the thesis has been approved by the department, a student may begin the electronic submission process by proceeding to the electronic thesis/dissertation (ETD) submission page. Please note that submission of an ETD is not the same as thesis deposit; the ETD is considered deposited only after all corrections requested by the Graduate College have been satisfactorily completed and all required supporting items have been received by the Thesis Office.