Programmatic honors students (for Polymathic Scholars and available to Health Science Scholars) meet programmatic expectations for the thesis rather than departmentally defined requirements. A typical thesis for these students is about 30–40 pages (or 60 for students double majoring with Plan II), double-spaced, plus references and any graphics or appendices the student may choose to include. It should be written for a well-educated but non-specialist audience.
Programmatic honors students typically do not report directly on lab work. Rather, many programmatic theses are inspired by students’ observations, which lead to a research question or related set of questions. Programmatic thesis projects typically present original analysis of existing data or scholarly literature but may involve some elements of original data collection. For example, students have performed content analyses, systematic literature reviews, policy reviews, and developed proposals for future research for their theses. We encourage students to talk with faculty mentors about appropriate and feasible methodological approaches early in the student’s thesis year, if not before.
Students who want to conduct human subjects research will need IRB approval and should start the IRB process no later than the summer before their thesis year.
Timeline, Roles and Responsibilities
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Year 2
Health Science Scholars (HSS)
NSC 109: Planning Your Capstone Project
Identify a capstone experience and several possible areas of interest for your thesis.
Polymathic Scholars (PS)
NSC 109: Field Invention
Define an interdisciplinary field of study and several possible areas of interest for your thesis.
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Year 3, Fall
NSC 110H: Thesis Exploration Seminar
Begin reading related to areas of interest; contact faculty to discuss possible research topics; and reflect on evolving thesis ideas.
HSS begin capstone experience.
Discuss thesis with all course instructors with relevant expertise.
Primary Faculty Advisor signs the thesis registration form.
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Year 3, Spring
Register your Primary Thesis Advisor (or BOTH co-supervisors) to be cleared to register for the required Thesis Planning Seminar NSC 323. Primary advisors must have a current faculty appointment at UT Austin.
HSS continue capstone experience.Primary Faculty Advisor meets with the thesis writer at least once before summer to discuss potential research questions and to plan a summer reading list.
Second Reader signs the thesis registration form.
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Year 4, Fall
NSC 323: Thesis Planning Seminar
Complete a literature review on your topic, analyze original data for your project, and create an outline for your thesis. Meet with primary advisors every 2-3 weeks. Confirm your second reader.
Primary Faculty Advisor meets with the thesis writer every 2-3 weeks to provide support and guidance related to the student’s research question, methodology, sources and developing argument.
Second Reader meets with the thesis writer each month to provide support and guidance related to the student’s research question, methodology, sources and developing argument.
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Year 4, Spring
NSC 371: Thesis Preparation Seminar
Complete a draft of your thesis in increments, participate in peer review, meet with primary advisor every other week, and meet with second reader monthly. Present thesis at the CNS Honors Thesis Symposium. Submit final thesis on Canvas AND to both advisors via email by the last day of classes.
Primary Faculty Advisor meets with the thesis writer every 2 weeks to provide support and guidance related to the student’s developing thesis structure and argument. The primary advisor will also provide a grade on the final thesis using a rubric supplied by the NSC 371 course instructor.
Second reader meets with the thesis writer once a month to provide support and guidance related to the student’s developing thesis structure and argument. The second reader will also provide a grade on the final thesis using a rubric supplied by the NSC 371 course instructor.
Coursework
Programmatic honors students take the thesis seminar sequence shown above. Broadly, these seminars offer scaffolding, support, and accountability for the student. The seminars typically meet once per week.
In the senior fall semester seminar (NSC 323), the seminar instructor leads students through the process of refining their topic in response to existing research; exploring library research databases relevant to their area of interest; reading at least one sample thesis; developing a log of at least 20 academic sources for the thesis (though students will need to continue to read additional sources well into the spring semester); writing a detailed annotated bibliography to help prepare them for the kind of writing and analysis we expect of the thesis itself; beginning an outline for the thesis project; evaluating their own writing and the writing of peers; and drafting the first few pages of their thesis. Students work in pairs and small groups regularly to brainstorm and share feedback. In addition, students meet one-on-one with their instructor and a graduate teaching assistant at least once per semester.
In the senior spring thesis seminar (NSC 371), students are required to submit incremental rough drafts of the thesis about every two weeks, adding at least five pages to their draft with each submission. Each draft receives feedback from either an instructor/graduate TA or a CNS Honors classmate. Students also refine and expand their outline; write and revise an abstract; workshop use of sources and citations; reflect on feedback they receive from instructors and peers; and peer review visual aids and practice for their graded thesis presentations at the CNS Honors Thesis Symposium in April. As in the fall, students meet one-on-one with their instructor and a graduate TA at least once.
Thus, the programmatic thesis seminars provide structure and support for the student’s development of their thesis, allowing faculty supervisors to focus on methodological and discipline-specific considerations in the student’s research and drafting. Please keep in mind that the thesis seminars serve students in a wide range of disciplines studying an even wider range of self-designed topics; our emphasis is on broadly applicable process development for literature research and writing.
Faculty Supervision
The student must secure the support of at least two UT faculty members to serve as mentors for the thesis project: either a primary supervisor and a second reader, or co-supervisors. Co-supervisors may be particularly appropriate if the student’s mentors need to share time commitments or offer complementary disciplinary expertise, or if the student identifies a strong mentor with expertise in the field who is not a faculty member in an academic department at UT. In general, supervisors and second readers will be affiliated with UT Austin; exceptions may be granted on a case-by-case basis. An advanced doctoral student with expertise in a relevant area may be approved to serve as second reader with the permission of the primary supervisor.
Students seek out faculty in departments and research units related to their capstone experiences to identify mentors who bring different perspectives to their topics. Mentors help guide the student’s research and they help brainstorm directions, approaches, and methodologies. They are not responsible for defining the student’s thesis topic for the student. Students are responsible for identifying and setting up meetings with relevant faculty members with the support and guidance of the thesis exploration seminar.
Students must secure a primary thesis supervisor no later than the first day of classes the fall semester of the thesis year. The student should secure a second reader before the first day of classes the spring semester of the senior year.
The student should meet with the primary supervisor(s) occasionally to discuss readings, possible thesis topics, methods, data collection (if applicable), structure, and written content appropriate to the discipline in which the student’s project is grounded. At minimum, the thesis supervisor should be willing to meet (or communicate) with the student at least once per month during the fall of the thesis year and at least every two to three weeks during the spring of the thesis year. In addition, the thesis supervisor should be willing to complete a very brief progress report, comment on at least one rough draft of the thesis in the spring, and provide a grade for the final thesis at the end of the spring term.
The responsibilities of the second reader are similar to that of the primary supervisor, but somewhat reduced in scope. We suggest that a second reader be willing to meet with the student at least once in the fall semester for brainstorming and/or to review the student’s reading list, and to meet at least twice in the spring to discuss the thesis itself. Second readers should plan to offer the student feedback on at least one rough draft of the thesis in mid- to late spring. Second readers participate in evaluating their student’s thesis, either independently or in coordination with the primary supervisor, by submitting a recommended grade at the end of the spring term.
Thesis Submission and Evaluation
For programmatic honors, the student’s final thesis has traditionally been due on the Tuesday after the last class day in the spring semester. The thesis seminar instructor will communicate directly with supervisors about the final thesis deadline at the beginning of the spring semester. If you need your student to submit their final thesis to you before the CNS Honors deadline, please communicate this to your student as soon as possible.
Programmatic honors thesis grades are integrated into the course grade for NSC 371; thus, the thesis seminar instructor is responsible for submitting student’s grades to the Registrar. The student’s faculty mentors will be prompted to submit their thesis grade recommendations to the seminar instructor via a secure Qualtrics form.
Contacts
Questions about thesis supervisor eligibility may be directed to Nicole Reed, Director of CNS Honors. Questions about the thesis seminar and thesis evaluation may be directed to Dr. Stacia Rodenbusch, the thesis seminar instructor. Students with questions about updating their field of study or other academic considerations should contact the PS Program Coordinator Scott Burghart.