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Tutke Guide: 1.2 External examination of the commentary of the doctoral research

1.2 External pre-examination of the commentary of the doctoral research

1.2.1 Permission for external pre-examination of the commentary and confirmation of the originality of the commentary

Based on statements of approval by the supervisors and the Contact Teacher, and after the originality of the manuscript has been confirmed, the Head of the Doctoral Programme of Artistic Research in Performing Arts grants permission for the external pre-examination of the commentary. The Research Council is notified of the permission.  

Confirming the originality of course work and research publications is part of the quality assurance of education and research. At the University of the Arts, originality checks are conducted using software based on global information search and comparison. The Contact Teacher is responsible for the originality checking process for doctoral degrees. The originality of the commentary must be confirmed before permission is granted for the external pre-examination of the commentary.

Once the supervisors and the Contact Teacher have studied the latest version of the manuscript of the commentary, the doctoral candidate asks them to submit their statements of approval for the commentary to be granted permission to be pre-examined. The statements are sent by email to the Planning Officer. At this point, the doctoral candidate should also make sure that they have completed all required study modules and that the credits appear on the transcript of records.

Having received the statements of approval, the doctoral candidate and the Contact Teacher conduct the originality check on Moodle. The process follows mostly the guidelines at Uniarts for Students (see Checking the originality of theses in Moodle), but the doctoral candidate must use the function to check incomplete work rather than the one for a final thesis. This is because of the potential corrections to the commentary following the pre-examination; the work must not be saved in the database in case it needs to be re-checked. The Contact Teacher checks the work, fills in the originality certificate, and sends it to the Planning Officer for filing. The Planning Officer then prepares the permission, to be granted by the Head of Tutke, for the commentary to be pre-examined.

Having been granted the permission for the external pre-examination of the commentary, the doctoral candidate submits the manuscript of the commentary, together with recordings of the artistic parts and an abstract in Finnish or Swedish and in English, to the Planning Officer at Tutke. The abstract must include a short description of the commentary and the artistic parts (see instructions for writing a summary of the dissertation in Appendix 1). The doctoral candidate must be enrolled as present throughout the process of the external pre-examination of the commentary.

1.2.2 External examination of the commentary

The commentary of the doctoral research must demonstrate the author’s in depth understanding of the artistic tradition and practice in the field, as well as the relevant artistic and scientific research. The commentary must also demonstrate the author’s ability to work independently, identify problems, produce new knowledge, as well as clear and coherent articulation. The commentary forms a coherent whole that is motivated in relation to the artistic parts, structuring different texts and audio-visual material in an understandable way. The commentary will be assessed considering how justifiably it produces such knowledge and conclusions that it claims to produce. It should be kept in mind in assessing the manuscript of the commentary that all parts of the doctoral research are published before the public examination takes place.

The external pre-examiners send in their statements to the Planning Officer within two months from receiving the task, who sends copies of the statements to the doctoral candidate, the supervisors, the Contact Teacher, and the members of the Research Council, and (in case the permission to be publicly examined is granted) also to the opponent and the Custos. 

The statement by the external pre-examiner states whether the external pre-examiner proposes that the commentary is accepted. In case the external examiner does not propose granting the permission to be publicly examined, they shall motivate the assessment and outline the significant changes that are required. The external pre-examination process can be suspended on the request of the doctoral student of by the decision of the Research Council. The doctoral candidate has a right to present a response to the external pre-examiner’s statement at the meeting of the Research Council of the Theatre Academy in case the external pre-examiner does not propose granting the right to be publicly examined. If only one of the external pre-examiners proposes granting the right for the doctoral research to be publicly examined, the Research Council makes the decision on the right to be publicly examined, based on the statements and the response. The statements and the eventual response are attached to the minutes of the Research Council meeting where the decision is made. 

In case the process is discontinued, it is the task of the Contact Teacher and the supervisors to supervise that the changes or corrections are made to the manuscript as required. The doctoral candidate can require a new external pre-examination when the required changes have been made to the manuscript and when the Contact Teacher and the supervisors recommend re-starting the external examination process. The Research Council appoints the same of new external pre-examiners for the work, and the process of external pre-examination of the commentary.