Dap Louw wrote:
I would appreciate information on the following:
1) How many other countries also have the external examiner system
like we have in South Africa? (I think we inherited it from the
British). This means that every thesis or dissertation has to be send
for evaluation to national and/or international external examiners who
are experts in the specific field.
Am I correct that the Americans and Canadians do not have an external
evaluation system?
We do not send it out. We have an external examiner on the defense
committee -- a person who was not involved in the research process and
is given a copy of the thesis or dissertation to appraise a few weeks
prior to the oral defense. For MA theses (this varies from U. to U. --
many have no defense for the MA thesis at all) we at York use a person
who is inside the university, but outside the candidate's department.
For PhD's we use someone who is outside the university. These people are
picked, technically, by the Dean, but in practice they are picked by the
candidate's supervisor and approved by the Dean.
2) A few years ago some departments of psychology in SA followed in
the footsteps of especially the Natural Sciences by introducing a
system where, instead of doing the traditional thesis or dissertation,
a student can hand in a number of publishable articles for his or her
master's or Ph.D. ( A panel of external examiners then decides whether
the articles are publishable.) I want to emphasize that the quantity
and quality of the research remain exactly the same as in the case of
the traditional thesis or dissertation * it's only the reporting of
the data that changes.
In how many other countries is this format acceptable?
We have had some debates about this sort of thing here. Generally it is
frowned upon as a case of "credentialling" past work (though the most
"natural scientific" area of our department seem to have less problem
with it than others). There are, however, some cases in which we have
allowed something like this to occur (e.g., the candidate has to
"repackage" past published work in the form of a traditional thesis, and
has to add at least some new research material). In any case, it has
been so rare as to not really require an overarching principle.
Regards,
--
Christopher D. Green
Department of Psychology
York University
Toronto, ON M3J 1P3
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.yorku.ca/christo
Office: 416-736-5115 ext. 66164
Fax: 416-736-5814
---
You are currently subscribed to tips as: [email protected]
To unsubscribe send a blank email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
