Current Student > Electronic Thesis and Dissertation (ETD)
Electronic Thesis and Dissertation - Overview
Welcome to the School of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies’ Electronic Theses & Dissertation site. These pages are dedicated to help you find all the information you need to format and successfully submit your thesis electronically.
Electronic Theses and Dissertations (ETDs) are prepared as text-based PDF files. ETDs can contain non-text elements such as sound, video, and hypertext links. ETDs are available through Scholarship@Western, Western's digital library repository, and also released to the world-wide web with priority in many search engines, enabling scholars worldwide to locate, search, and download the University of Western Ontario's ETDs.
The most significant benefit is the dramatic increase (50 - 250%) in citation impact that results from electronic publishing. This leads to increased rewards from universities, in the form of promotion and increased salary, and from granting agencies.
Other benefits include:
- free publicity for your research - authors of electronic theses become more widely known and their reputations are enhanced
- easy worldwide access to your theses for colleagues and collaborators
- easy worldwide access to your theses for job and grant applications
- a raised profile for your research institutions
- reduced costs at the point of graduation since there is no need to have multiple copies printed.
Producing Your Thesis
- Read the information under Formatting and review the ETD template to familiarize yourself with the formatting requirements. SGPS Guidelines are the minimum technical requirements. Differing disciplines may have their own conventions, so please check with your supervisor for discipline-specific formatting.
- Use the SGPS thesis template as early on as possible. This will simplify formatting and enhance the eventual PDF conversion of your thesis. Otherwise, use the style, indexing and table of contents tools of your word processing program.
- Multiple file formats are an option with an ETD submission. The primary thesis file must be in .pdf, .rtf or .doc format upon submission but an ETD can contain non-text elements such as multimedia, sound, video, as well as text and hypertext links. Details will be found under Submission. Use the required file naming convention early on. It will simplify uploading your ETD submission.
- Securing copyright permission can take time. Start early. See the Copyright section for information on how to determine whether copyright permission is needed for your thesis and how to obtain it.
Submitting Your Thesis for Examination - Preliminary Steps
- Before you can submit an ETD for preliminary examination, you must submit the following to SGPS:
- Read the submission information page to walk you step-by-step through the process. Familiarize yourself with the procedure.
- Scan any photographs, maps, or other graphical materials into acceptable electronic file formats.
- Double-check that:
- your submission file is accurate
- page numbers listed in the Table of Contents match exactly the page numbers for each section or element in the text
- all embedded graphics or other elements are properly situated in the text
- all hyperlinks are working properly
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Consult the Submission information page if using non-PDF supplementary files in your ETD.
Submitting Your Thesis for Examination - Final Steps
- If not done previously, register with Scholarship@Western. See the submission information page for further directions.
- Once registered and your Thesis Examination Board form is forwarded to SGPS, you may submit your thesis. You are able to interrupt your submission at any step, save your work, and return to it at a later time.
- The School of Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies will review your ETD and supporting documents. You will receive an e-mail stating that your ETD submission has been received. One business day later, your submission is locked from editing and distributed to your examiners for evaluation. If there are any problems, you will receive an e-mail notifying you of what action is required. Once a preliminary decision is made concerning your work, a communication will be directed to you via e-mail.
Final Submission of Your Thesis
- Upon successful examination of your thesis, you are directed to submit a final copy of the work through Scholarship@Western.
- If any revisions were required as a result of your examination, your submission will be reviewed by your supervisor to ensure those changes are made.
- Once this copy has the necessary approvals, your work will be published to the public section of Scholarship@Western.
Publication and Distribution of Your Thesis
Your thesis will be available online at Scholarship@Western and on the web up to two weeks following your final submission. Scholarship@Western theses will have priority in many search engines.
Proquest/UMI will create an archival quality microfilm copy of the thesis for Library & Archives Canada, and will also catalogue your thesis and publish the abstract in the ProQuest Dissertations & Theses (PQDT) database. ProQuest is a commercial information vendor (and a commercial publisher in the case of ETDs) that makes profits by charging libraries or individuals fees for access to the full text of ETDs. Proquest makes theses available in digital or paper format for a fee.
Before electronic submission, this was the only way to obtain copies of theses apart from borrowing them from university libraries or contacting authors directly. You retain copyright to your thesis and may make it available on a personal website and pursue other sources of publication as well.
Departmental Copies
Your graduate unit may require one or more bound paper copies of your thesis. Please consult your department administrator about departmental requirements such as the colour of the cover, and single- or double-sided printing, Apart from these considerations, the general guidelines for thesis production should be followed.
Thesis Binding
If you require a binding service, this is available through Western Graphic Services. This is only an option; you may use any binding service that you prefer.
Delay of Thesis Publication
Publication of your thesis by the University is a requirement of your degree, but sometimes it is necessary to delay publication. Typical reasons for embargo include:
- Anticipated publication of part of your thesis in a journal, or publication of the thesis as a book
- Content of a sensitive nature in the thesis, the publication of which might endanger the wellbeing of the author or of persons associated with the work
- A patent in process
Please discuss restriction with your supervisor and the chair of your graduate unit if you think it may be appropriate. Requesting a delay on publication is part of the submission process.
