On this page you can find most of the rules regarding the Master’s thesis.
The complete set of rules can be found in the academic regulations for the programme.
Are you a master’s degree student following the prescribed study programme, you will automatically be registered for your master’s thesis at the fourth semester of your degree programme with a submission deadline on 1 June. However, you are responsible for checking, that your registration is correct. The deadline for assessment/the oral defense is 6 weeks, counting from the submission day. If you submit your thesis by June 1, your oral defence will be no later than June 30.
The registration takes place at this point in time, as this gives you the possibility to carry through three exam attempts in your master’s thesis within your maximum duration of studies.
If your maximum duration of studies is extended or shortened, your (automatic) registration will depend on your maximum duration of studies.
If you do not follow the scheduled programme and are registered for writing the Master’s thesis in the autumn semester, you have a deadline for registering a (tentative) thesis title on 1 June and must submit the thesis on 1 January. The deadline for assessment/the oral defense is 6 weeks, counting from the submission day.
Even though you will be registered automatically for your Master’s thesis, please be aware that you have to register the (tentative) thesis title and your problem statement by completing the thesis registration web form by 1 December (see below). Even if you do not complete the thesis registration web form at the outset of the 4. semester, you will still formally have started your thesis writing period. This means that your thesis writing period is counted from the time when you are registered automatically and not from the time when you complete the thesis registration web form.
If you are registered for your Master’s thesis in the autumn semester because you do not follow the scheduled MA programme, you will have to register the (tentative) thesis title and your problem statement by completing the thesis registration web by 1 June. The submission deadline for the Master’s thesis is 1 January.
The deadline for the oral defence is 6 weeks, counting from the submission date.
If you submit your thesis by June 1, your oral defence will be no later than June 30.
Please note: Once you have been registered, you cannot cancel your registration.
| Semester for writing the Master’s thesis | Deadline for registering thesis title and problem statement | Submission deadline | Submission deadline* 2nd examination attempt | Submission deadline* 3rd examination attempt |
| Spring | 1 December | 1 June | 1 September | 1 December |
Autumn (only by exemption) | 1 June | 1 January | 1 April | 1 July |
*These submission deadlines are for you who do not submit the thesis within the 1st or 2nd deadline. If you fail your thesis there are other rules and submission deadlines (see below: "Handing in the thesis").
NB! If the submission date is a Saturday, Sunday or a holiday, the deadline is the first working day after the deadline.
THE MASTER'S THESIS PROCESS
1. Choose one subject area as the main area for which you would like supervision (cf Appendix: subject areas below). Even if your thesis is a combination of several subject areas, you need to decide on one main subject area in which you want to position your thesis.
2. Supervisor allocation
3 . Supervision (February 1 – May 31)
4. Thesis submission deadlines
5. Defence
6. Exceptions
In exceptional cases, you can be granted permission to start your thesis in September 2019. Refer to the study counselors, should this become relevant for you. The timeline would be as follows:
If a due date falls on a weekend day or public holiday, the due date is moved to the next working day.
APPENDIX – Topic Registration on Blackboard
1) Subject areas (Choose only one)
2) Methods for data collection (Multiple choices possible)
3) Methods of data analysis (Multiple choices possible)
OR:
Remember to complete the thesis registration web form by 1 December. Please remember to check that you have stated the correct master's degree programme before submitting your registration.
In order to improve your career prospects, we need to collect information on the companies/organisations that you may collaborate with.
Once you have registered for your Master’s thesis, you will receive a form in your AU mailbox. The form contains a few questions regarding your collaboration with the company/organisation.
You must complete the form regardless of whether you are collaborating with a company/organisation or not.
Your Master’s thesis must only be uploaded in WiseFlow. You are not allowed to hand in a paper copy of the thesis, as it is the uploaded version that is legally binding. When you have handed in the thesis in WiseFlow it will automatically be send to supervisor and external examiner.
WISEflow
You will receive an e-mail from WISEflow when it is possible to upload your Master's thesis. Deadline for handing in the thesis in WISEflow is 1 June at 12:00. This means that you should begin uploading well in advance and no later than 10 minutes before deadline, since the flow closes exactly at 12:00.
If you experience problems with uploading your thesis, please contact the technical and/or administrative support.
Once you have uploaded your thesis it is not possible to withdraw it. Therefore, you must make absolutely sure that you upload the correct version.
The flow is set up as a “group-flow”.
If the Master's thesis is written by one person you must choose "Create one-person group" in WISEflow. If you have not previously tried to upload an assignment in WISEflow as a group, please read and follow the instructions on how to submit as a group.
The thesis including appendixes must be saved as one PDF-file and uploaded under “Paper”. Read more on how to convert your paper to PDF.
Under the category “Extra material” you can upload material like movies, sound, programs (Excel, SAS mv.). The extra material does not have to be a pdf-file and you can hand in more than one file up to a maximum size of 5 GB.
Confidential theses
You are not required to attach your confidentiality agreement when you upload and submit your Master's thesis.
When you upload your Master's thesis in WISEflow, you must indicate (in the 'Cover') whether the thesis contains confidential material.
When you upload your thesis in Theses@bss, you can choose whether you want the thesis to be confidential and therefore not available for reading and/or lending.
Handing in from 15 May - 31 May
Theses handed in from 15 May -31 May will not be sent to evaluation before the deadline 1 June.
Oral defense
The department will send you information regarding the oral defence of the thesis either via mail or BlackBoard. The deadline for assessment/the oral defense is 6 weeks, counting from the submission day.
No access to OneDrive after graduation
Once your last grade is registered you will no longer have access to OneDrive. This means that you have to download and transfer your files from OneDrive before finishing your programme.
It is not possible to restore access to OneDrive once you have finished your programme at Aarhus University.
If you do not hand in your thesis on time, please note that the form Approval of modified thesis description has to be signed and submitted immediately (within one week) after the deadline of the failed submission. If the form is not submitted, you lose the right to supervision. The three months begin at the deadline of the failed submission and will not be postponed if you do not hand in this form.
If the thesis is not handed in before the deadline, you have used one examination attempt. You will automatically be registered for your second examination attempt.
You must contact your supervisor within the first 14 days after the submission deadline and, in collaboration with your supervisor, prepare and agree on a modified problem statement.
It is your responsibility to contact your supervisor to initiate this process.
You have a new deadline of three months to submit the thesis, starting from the initial deadline. This means that your second attempt will run from 1 June-1 September (spring semester) or 1 January-1 April (autumn semester).
The same procedure will follow if you do not submit your thesis within the deadline of your second examination attempt.
If you do not hand in your master’s thesis by the new deadline, you will use the second of the three attempts you have for passing your Master’s thesis, and your third attempt begins immediately after the failed submission.
You must contact your supervisor within the first 14 days after the submission deadline and, in collaboration with your supervisor, prepare and agree on a modified problem statement.
It is your responsibility to contact your supervisor to initiate this process.
Your third (and final) deadline will be three months after the second deadline, which means that your third attempt will run from September 1-December 1 (spring semester - because of the Christmas holidays, the oral defence will take place December 1-January 15) or April 1-July 1 (autumn semester - because of the summer break, the oral defence will take place in August).
If you fail your thesis, please note that the form ‘Approval of modified thesis description’ has to be signed and submitted immediately (within one week) after the deadline for the oral defence. If the form is not submitted, you lose the right to supervision. The three months begin at the deadline for the oral defence and will not be postponed if you do not hand in this form.
If you fail your Master’s thesis, you will use one of the three attempts you have for passing your thesis, and your second attempt begins immediately after the failed thesis.
You must contact your supervisor within the first 14 days after the date of assessment and, in collaboration with your supervisor, prepare and agree on a modified problem statement.
It is your responsibility to contact your supervisor to initiate this process.
Your second deadline will be approximately three months after the deadline for the oral defence, which means that your second attempt will run from July 1-October 1 with oral defence October 1-October 31 (spring semester) or February 1-May 1 with oral defense May 1-May 31 (autumn semester).
If you fail your Master’s thesis by the new deadline, you will use the second of the three attempts you have for passing your Master’s thesis, and your third attempt begins immediately after the failed thesis.
You must contact your supervisor within the first 14 days after the date of assessment and, in collaboration with your supervisor, prepare and agree on a modified problem statement.
It is your responsibility to contact your supervisor to initiate this process.
Your third deadline will be approximately three months after the second deadline for the oral defense, which means that your third attempt will run from November 1-February 1 with oral defense February 1-February 28 (spring semester) or June 1-September 1 with oral defense September 1-September 30 (autumn semester).
A master’s thesis that integrates the project-based internship and the master’s thesis so that the thesis is a continuation of the portfolio which is prepared as part of the project-based internship is an Internship-based Master’s Thesis. Thus, if the student’s programme fulfills this requirement, the master’s thesis will be recognised as an Internship-based Master’s Thesis on the exam transcript.
Students from Aarhus BSS often cooperate with private companies or organisations when writing their thesis. In this connection, these external partners may have an understandable wish to prevent any third party from getting access to confidential information.
For this reason, Aarhus BSS has established a set of rules with procedures and obligations committing Aarhus BSS as an institution in connection with a confidentiality procedures. Further, School of Business and Social Sciences has made an optional agreement form which the student and the company/organisation may use in order to sign a mutual confidentiality agreement.
Aarhus BSS's procedures and obligations
If a company or an organisation - when cooperating with a student from School of Business and Social Sciences on a thesis - requests for confidentiality about knowledge acquired by School of Business and Social Sciences and the student, School of Business and Social Sciences is obliged to comply with the below-mentioned 'School of Business and Social Sciences Thesis – Confidentiality Rules'.
Please note that main part of these rules only becomes effective, if the thesis is marked as 'Confidential'.
Aarhus BSS's confidentiality agreement
Version 1.0
The following rule applies, if a student writing his/her thesis informs his/her academic supervisor about a secrecy agreement made with a company or an organisation:
1. The supervisor is bound to observe professional secrecy about the company knowledge acquired in the super-vising process.
Furthermore, if the thesis is marked 'Confidential' because of the above-mentioned agreement, the following rules apply:
2. The submitted copies of the thesis will only be available for the supervisor/examiner, external examiner and the necessary administrative staff, and copies will not be distributed to others.
3. The supervisor/examiner and the external examiner are bound to observe professional secrecy about the company knowledge acquired from the thesis and the oral examination, if any.
4. School of Business and Social Sciences' administrative staff is bound to secrecy about any company knowledge acquired from the thesis.
5. The supervisor/examiner has to ensure that the oral examination (if any) is held behind closed doors.
6. If the School of Business and Social Sciences Library receives a copy of the thesis, it will not be available for reading and/or lending.
7. In the case of an appeal in connection with an exam complaint, the thesis will be available for all members of the appeals committee, who will be bound to professional secrecy, as described in item 3.
If the company/organisation wishes a written certificate stating the compliance of these rules, the Confidentiality Certificate should be completed. The wording of this certificate is identical with the above-mentioned text. The company/organisation completes the certificate with the company/organisation name, student name and thesis title and forward it to the academic supervisor for signing.