Thesis defense

[arierty]

What is the normal time limit for undergrad. I go to a small undergrad with an optional thesis, which for some stupid reason I chose to do... But we haven't had anyone do a thesis in a few years, my advisor is kind of wingin' it with me, so the question is how long should I tell her I think the defense needs to be? It seems like an odd question but any help would be great!

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[SaginawPremed]

Theses are incredibly common at my school. I think the typical one is 60 or so pages. But I think more importantly, the length needs to be what's sufficient, and not some arbitrary number you adjust your content to reach.

 

[nockamura]

Why would you opt to write a thesis if the other option was not writing a thesis?

 

[SaginawPremed]

Why would you opt to write a thesis if the other option was not writing a thesis?

Nockamura! Enrich yourself!

 

[skiracer90]

What is the normal time limit for undergrad. I go to a small undergrad with an optional thesis, which for some stupid reason I chose to do... But we haven't had anyone do a thesis in a few years, my advisor is kind of wingin' it with me, so the question is how long should I tell her I think the defense needs to be? It seems like an odd question but any help would be great!

Let's see. With my terminal case of senioritis, I expect my defense to be around 20 minutes followed by 10 minutes of questions from my committee. As long as you present the main points from your thesis, you should be fine. I don't think a strict time frame is needed. If you're talking about actual thesis length, I'd say it could run anywhere between 45-70 pages. It all depends on how good your data is and how much effort you really want to expend. I'm sorta cramming to get mine finished right now for my defense in mid-May. Can I just say that this was the lamest idea I ever had? Let me just ruin the last semester of my senior year because I have my thesis hanging over my head. I'm not saying it's preventing me from going out and partying, but I do feel guilty every night I'm not working on it (there are more nights I'm not writing than writing these days). I say screw the thesis and do a poster presentation or something if you're looking for a little boost in your med school application. It's just a big pain in the ass.

 

[Ross434]

Nockamura! Enrich yourself!

What's nockamura??

And secondly - do these theses help a lot more for grad school admissions? If by chance med school isnt in the future?? Is it unwise to do this as an engineer if i'm already doing a senior design capstone?? (aagh the torture)

 

[arierty]

yeah i was talkin' about presentation length. i think the length of actual text for my written thesis is only 26 pages or so, but graphs, appendices and others abound

 

[nockamura]

Nockamura! Enrich yourself!

I'm totally for enriching oneself, but it sounds like the OP doesn't even know really what a thesis is. I think I'd figure out more about the process prior to committing myself to such a large project.

 

[Caesarsgrl]

Length just depends, at my school we do research in the labs and then write on our findings, with the goal and design of getting published, Max length for us is 25 pages, ( more is unrealistic, the point is to get to the gut and say what's necessary and nothing more) but I spent 2 years doing the research in the lab and working with the mice. Then we have a poster presentation where you design a poster with a summary of your thesis, your data etc, and then there's a panel or group that gets to ask you questions,

The reason to write the thesis for us at least is to get departmental honors in biology

 

[nockamura]

Length just depends, at my school we do research in the labs and then write on our findings, with the goal and design of getting published, Max length for us is 25 pages, ( more is unrealistic, the point is to get to the gut and say what's necessary and nothing more) but I spent 2 years doing the research in the lab and working with the mice. Then we have a poster presentation where you design a poster with a summary of your thesis, your data etc, and then there's a panel or group that gets to ask you questions,

The reason to write the thesis for us at least is to get departmental honors in biology

Ok. Honors makes sense, but just doing something that's difficult because it's difficult doesn't make sense to me.

 

[Caesarsgrl]

Ok. Honors makes sense, but just doing something that's difficult because it's difficult doesn't make sense to me.

Agreed! Doing it for honors hasn't even felt like that much motivation lately, I finished classes and all I'm doing is working and editing my thesis, but the first official draft went in today, (that was after like 20 unofficial drafts before that) which is a load off for at least half a week.

 

[nockamura]

Agreed! Doing it for honors hasn't even felt like that much motivation lately, I finished classes and all I'm doing is working and editing my thesis, but the first official draft went in today, (that was after like 20 unofficial drafts before that) which is a load off for at least half a week.

I'm not sure if you meant to do this, but you spelled School wrong in your sig.

 

[arierty]

I finished my first official draft today, it's goin' to my advisor tomorrow and we'll see. But yeah, I am happy to have a few days off. Mine is for departmental honors too.

 

[mdsadler]

mine is for honours as well. our written paper is supposed to be similar to something that you would hope to publish and about 25-30 pages and our presentations (defense) is only 15 minutes with 5 minutes of questions. i personally know i can talk about my project for an hour at least so 15 minutes is going to be difficult to get across the main reasons for studying what i did and then summing up the results etc.

good luck with your defense.

 

[Thundrstorm]

Theses are required for bio, chem, and biochem majors at my school (if you do an internship instead of research, you have to write a "thesis-length paper"). In bio, we either have to make a 15 minute presentation at a conference (regional or at the college) or do a poster presentation. Chem majors have to do a formal defense, which lasts approx. 1 hr, including questions. The length of my actual paper should be 40-50 pages. I wish I got honors for it; it's a ton of work.

 

[javert]

What is the normal time limit for undergrad.

It probably varies from school to school...even at my school it depends on the department (chem majors, for example, just do a poster presentation...nothing oral).

For neuroscience at my school, we are told to plan on the public defense taking 30-60 minutes and the private defense with the committee taking an additional hour. I just defended my thesis last Friday; my public presentation lasted 45 minutes and my private defense took 1:15, for a total of 2 hours.

 

[rugirlie]

Mine was probably like an hour- hour 1/2 in total... my committee interrupted me throughout with questions and all so yea... but it was very non-scary and informal Good luck!!