TIL Thesis

Individual research (or design) project at MSc level.

Your thesis project is assessed at regular moments. The following 4 meetings with the thesis assessment committee are mandatory in order to guarantee the quality of each project. Ask the chair if a presentation should be prepared in case of the kick-off, mid-term and green light meeting.

*The formal start is the Kick-off meeting. Here the Kick-off document (= project proposal) is assessed. A key element in the kick-off document is a description of the research gap in the field of your study. Your project is meant to reduce this gap with scientific methods. A small literature review helps to identify this research gap. The practical relevance for a problem owner (company) is a second-order effect. Take care that you balance the aims of your commissioner and your TUD supervisors.

*The next milestone is your Mid-term Meeting. In a mid-term meeting the content and status of your project will be on the agenda. As a benchmark, you should have finished the analysis part of your work and have rewritten your initial problem definition in terms of solutions. An outlook into the solution space could be discussed, if the time allows. An updated planning scheme should always be discussed. If you experience problems while working at the commissioner, discuss this also before or in this meeting.

*The Green light meeting is very important. A green light report should contain:

• Summary (and Executive summary if a commissioner wants this) in English (and also in Dutch in case of a Dutch government agency);

• Analysis in full;

• Design/solution space in full (in case of a design project);

• The conclusions in draft;

• Tools verified, validated, experiments with results;

• (Where appropriate:) a user manual for the tool can be written later.

• Appendices with details about data sets, model structure (not code), statistics, evaluation etc.

Work to be done: Research paper, final conclusions, final summary, minor editing and language check, finish appendices, printing and binding of hard copies.

*The Final Thesis Defense is the Grand Finale of your project.

The final thesis report = the improved green light report plus

• Acknowledgement;

• Research Paper as Appendix A.

The structure and length of the Final Thesis Defense meeting may differ per department and chair(wo)man. Contact the chair of your Committee or his or her secretary.

A TIL5060 Grading rubric is used to assess your thesis project in a break-out meeting. It is used to grade the:

1. Research quality;

2. Research competences;

3. Quality of final report;

4. Quality of oral presentation en defense.

At most one learning outcome (A - D) may receive a mark below 6. The four sub marks are weighted and then summed. The final mark is determined by the assessment committee and ultimately by its chair.

For more information on grading, see article 14 in the Rules and Guidelines (RGBE): https://www.tudelft.nl/studenten/faculteiten/citg-studentenportal/onderwijs/onderwijsinformatie/educational-rules-and-regulations

Permitted Materials during Exam

Audiovisual equipment, final thesis report, thesis input material, slide presentation and handout, (simulation) model, movie, notes.