Multi-part thesis submissions  Multi-part thesis guidance: practice-led PGRs (Faculty of Arts Humanities and Cultures only)

During this pilot phase, practice-led PGRs will be asked to complete and submit a notification of a multi-part practice-led thesis form at examination entry to confirm the intended format of their thesis submission. 

Form needed: Notification of a Multi-part practice-led thesis (Word, 32.35KB)

• If examiners are required to view live practice the examination, you must complete entry workflow at least 3 months before the date of the first live practice. 
• If there is no examined live practice event, you must complete the workflow at least 3 months before thesis submission.

This form will collect information on:

• File types: information on the format and content of the files, including any additional software required to open the files. Accessibility and long-term preservation should be considered when choosing file formats. If you will need to submit anything in physical format, please indicate this on the form so that Doctoral College Operations can contact you to discuss arrangements. Depending on the nature and format of the intended submission, advice may need to be sought from the Library to support the eventual archive of the final thesis. 
• Confidentiality and sensitivity of materials: the School must assess whether any of the files include sensitive or highly confidential data or materials. If so, confirmation must be provided that the University guidelines for the handling and storage of data have been followed and sharing of this content with the examiners (and longer-term as part of the thesis in WREO) is consistent with the approach outlined in ethics review and any contractual agreements. 
• Long term preservation: in addition to the written commentary in PDF, all examined practice material must eventually be deposited to WREO in an appropriate format. For the eThesis, it will not be possible to deposit links/URLs that lead to practice material, as content hosted externally (e.g. via youTube, Vimeo, websites, etc.) cannot be relied upon for long-term preservation. Consideration should be given to the accessibility of the thesis to a wider audience. Open formats should be used where possible.
  • If files require proprietary software, an additional open format version should be supplied where feasible e.g. .xlsx could also be .csv. Files in a non-proprietary format increase chances of long-term access and preservation.
  • Exceptionally, links to University-managed systems which use permanent identifiers may be considered. The proposal should be included in form and requires agreement from the Doctoral College and Library.
  • If you feel it might be necessary to redact part of a multi-part thesis before deposit to WREO please email the Library at lib-etheses@leeds.ac.uk and email the Doctoral College Operations at rp_examinations@adm.leeds.ac.uk (copying both into the same email) as early as possible in advance of making your submission. The Library team will be happy to provide advice and support to help you in your planning. Please email the Library at lib-etheses@leeds.ac.uk as early as possible in advance of making your submission.  

The thesis (the written commentary and any associated practice files) should be submitted for examination to GRAD. A Multi-part thesis index file must be submitted alongside the thesis to confirm the different files which form the complete thesis.

Form needed: Multi-part thesis index file (Word, 32.21KB)

This index file will be shared with your examiners to assist them with navigation of materials. If any of your files (outside the PDF written commentary) are very large please consider hosting it elsewhere and providing a link to the file to Doctoral College Operations using OneDrive or SharePoint.

Do not use Google Docs, Dropbox and other file sharing platforms, as we have no agreement with them to handle University data. The link will be shared with your examiners. If links will be embedded within the thesis itself, please indicate this on your index form.  

The University requires a permanent record of the complete ‘thesis’ on which the award will be made; this means that in addition to the written commentary in PDF, you will need to deposit all examined practice material to WREO as separate files in an appropriate format (e.g. pdf, jpeg, mp3, etc.). PGRs will be placed on the pass list only once it has been confirmed that suitable files for both the written commentary and the examined practice have been successfully deposited to WREO.

You will have the option of setting an embargo for each individual file uploaded to WREO, if necessary and supported by your supervisor.

A Multi-part thesis index file must be submitted alongside the eThesis.

Form needed: Multi-part thesis index file (Word, 32.21KB)

It will not be possible to deposit links/URLs that lead to practice material, as content hosted externally cannot be relied upon for long-term preservation. It may have been exceptionally agreed at the point of examination entry that links to University-managed systems which use permanent identifiers will be used. Please see the long-term preservation section in the previous Stage 1 section for further guidance.