STUDY

Master and Diploma Theses

Objective

Academic integrity and the adherence to the principles of good scientific practice are essential prerequisites for any academic endeavour (for further information please refer to the Code of Conduct, which has been drawn up to safeguard good scientific practice).

This is in the interests of both students and teaching staff at the University of Klagenfurt.
Consequently, all academic theses are automatically checked for internet plagiarism.
The usual process involves the following steps:

Notification of topic and choice of supervisor

In line with the curriculum of your degree programme, you choose your topic in consultation with your supervisor. The person you choose as supervisor should hold a doctorate or have completed the habilitation post-doctoral qualification.
Please find detailed information on choosing a co-supervisor here in the guidelines of the Rector of Studies.

If you decide to select a pre-evaluator, the rules state that your supervisor must have completed the habilitation, while the pre-evaluator has not yet gained her/his habilitation qualification.

If the thesis is a collaboration by several students, it must be possible to assess the contribution of each individual student separately. (Universities Act 2002 Section 81 Para. 3)

Please go to My Applications in the online Campus System > Submit new application > Applications for academic theses to submit your application for supervision of a Master or Diploma thesis.

The guidelines issued by the Office of Academic Affairs state that the supervisor or topic is approved for a period of 2 years. An extension of this term by an additional year can be arranged by your supervisor.

A new section titled “Academic Work” will appear in the Campus system and will display details about the thesis that has been approved. The status of your thesis application is set to “Approved”. At the same time, your borrower status in the library will also be set to “Graduand status”.

Should your topic change significantly, or in case of a necessary / relevant change of supervisor, please remember to go to “My Applications” and submit an “Application to cancel an academic thesis”.

Title page and Affidavit

Please generate the title page in your student portal under “Meine wissenschaftlichen Arbeiten (My academic papers)” and download there the file “Affidavit“, which has to be adapted according to the instructions. Incorporate these two pages into your master’s/diploma thesis before uploading it.

Phased assessment of a Master’s thesis or Diploma thesis

Students may request the phased assessment of a Master’s thesis or Diploma thesis following the successful completion of defined components (Master’s or Diploma thesis modules). Please note, the phased assessment is not mandatory.

It is only permissible to assess a maximum of three completed components. The 1^st and 2^nd completed component comprise 8 ECTS credits each. A positive assessment shall be recorded as “participated with success” and a negative assessment shall be recorded as “participated without success”. The final completed component (= the submitted Master’s or Diploma thesis) comprises the ECTS credits that are still missing from the total credits as defined in the curriculum.

If you decide to opt for the phased assessment of your Master’s thesis or Diploma thesis, corresponding proof must be uploaded together with the application requesting the phased assessment. Both the definition of what constitutes a completed component and the determination of the corresponding proof shall be announced in the university bulletin by the responsible curricular commission. The relevant link along with further information can be found in the corresponding online application form in the Campus system.

Applications can be submitted via the Campus system. Go to My applications > Submit new application > Applications relating to academic theses > application requesting the assessment of the 1^st completed component of a Master’s or Diploma thesis. As soon as this application has been approved, the application requesting the assessment of the 2^nd completed component of a Master’s or Diploma thesis will be unlocked.

Submitting your thesis

You write your thesis whilst maintaining regular contact with your supervisor as agreed.

Once your supervisor informs you that your thesis can now be uploaded, you can generate a personalised title page for your thesis, by going to Academic Work / Administration in the Campus system, which must be included in your thesis. Moreover, you can also access the template for the sworn declaration / affidavit here, which must be incorporated into your thesis.

You then upload your completed thesis in the Campus system under Academic Work. This is done as follows:

Convert your document to PDF format in order to upload it. Should you need it, you can request technical support by calling the Central information technology service (ZID) Hotline: +43 463 2700 9666

As soon as your work is available as PDF, you can perform the upload in the Campus system / Academic Work / Tasks. The status of your thesis in the online student portal is now set to “Uploaded”.

Upon the request of the supervisor, you must present her / him with a printed copy. Please consult your supervisor in this matter.

In the next step, the academic thesis will be formally reviewed by the Admissions and Examinations Office – subsequently, your thesis will be assigned the status “Submitted“.

Online publication

The university endeavours to publish academic theses online. Within the scientific community, academic thesis published online (which are subsequently accessible globally through the Library Association) are also regarded as publications. However, if you intend to have your Master thesis or Diploma thesis published as a book by a publishing company, please contact the publisher in advance und ascertain that the online publication does not interfere with the planned book publication.

If you are interested in publishing your academic thesis online, please provide your statement of consent during the upload process. Please note, however, that your master / diploma thesis can only be published online, provided that your supervisor has agreed to this during the evaluation process.

Online publication agreement

From Oct. 1st, 2023 applies: The positively graded Master’s or Diploma thesis shall be published in an open, electronically accessible repository (Universities Act 2002 Section 18 Para. 5).

Plagiarism check and assessment

As soon as the formal review by the Admissions and Examinations Office has been completed (status “submitted”), a plagiarism inspection report is generated on the basis of your upload, using the DocoL©c software. During the evaluation period, at the very latest, your supervisor will assign the status “No plagiarism” or “Plagiarism”.

Within a period of two months from the date of submission of your master / diploma thesis, your supervisor will provide an assessment report, which you can download from “Academic Work” in the Campus system. The status of your academic thesis is now set to “assessed”.

Temporary bar on access

Duty to publish academic theses

In principle, academic theses must be published (§ 86 para. 1 Universities Act (UA), “Duty to Publish“). Above all, this is because the author of an academic thesis should be prepared to be challenged by the scientific community, and because the duty to publish helps to counteract other potential transgressions. This statutory duty to publish is mandatory and consequently it cannot be rescinded by an agreement with a company, an institution, or a third party.

On submitting a piece of scientific or artistic work which has received a positive evaluation, the author shall be entitled to apply for a temporary bar on access to the copies deposited for a limited period not exceeding five years from the time of delivery (§ 86 para. 2 UA). The Rector for Academic Affairs shall allow such an application, if the student establishes beyond a doubt that significant legal or business interests of the student (and not those of a business, of an institution, or of a third party) would be materially endangered by permitting access. Such an application for a temporary bar on access must be lodged online within two weeks from the date of notification of the positive evaluation, using the Campus system. Subsequent applications cannot be considered. Both the application for a temporary bar on access and the duration requested must be duly substantiated.

The “protection of personal data” (“data protection”) does not qualify as a valid argument to substantiate the temporary bar on access to an academic thesis, because, as a matter of principle, the obligation to protect personal data is not subject to any limitation. The Data Protection Act includes special provisions pertaining to the use of personal data for the purposes of scientific research or statistics. In particular, any direct reference to persons must be encrypted immediately, if data involving indirect or anonymous references to persons is deemed to suffice during individual stages of the scientific or statistical work.

Refer to § 7 of the Federal Act concerning the Protection of Personal Data (German abbreviation DSG): https://www.ris.bka.gv.at/Dokumente/Bundesnormen/NOR40195903/NOR40195903.pdf

The mere reference to a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) with a third party cannot serve as a suitable argument to obtain a temporary bar on access to an academic thesis, because such an obligation to maintain confidentiality is generally agreed without any time limitation. By contrast, an academic thesis is accessible to the public after a maximum of five years in any case.

A “non-disclosure notice“ may only be recorded in the thesis by the Office of Admissions and Records and only in cases where the Rector for Academic Affairs has allowed the temporary bar on access.

Registering for the examination concluding the degree programme

Once all the requirements for taking the examination that concludes the degree programme (e.g. the courses you have submitted have been approved and the evaluator’s report has been received) have been fulfilled, and provided that your degree programme is concluded with a final examination, the link “Register for the examination concluding the degree programme” will appear in the Campus system under “My Applications”. Please note that a deadline of three weeks must be observed between the date of your registration and the planned date of the final examination.

After passing the examination, you can register for the graduation ceremony.

Contact

Yvonne Deana

Responsible for the formal examination of the upload of Master’s and diploma theses
available Mon and Fri

E-Mail: yvonne [dot] Deana [at] aau [dot] at

Amanda Veladzic

Registration for the academic graduation ceremony

Responsible for the formal examination of the upload of Master’s and diploma theses
available Tue-Thu

E-Mail: Amanda [dot] Veladzic [at] aau [dot] at

Mag. Ulrike Eder-Jele

Responsible for the formal examination for Master’s and diploma theses of the Faculty of Management, Economics & Law and the Faculty of Technical Science

E-Mail: Ulrike [dot] Eder [at] aau [dot] at

MMag. Claudia Wald

Responsible for the formal examination for Master’s and diploma theses of the Faculty of Arts, Humanities & Education and the Faculty of Social Science

E-Mail: Claudia [dot] Wald [at] aau [dot] at