PhD Studies

Introduction

PhD Studies at the SDS are offered by all four departments of the School.

At the SDS earning a PhD Degree takes a minimum period of four years; it is worth 240 academic credits, which would normally be achieved at a rate of 60 of them on every year of studies and research work, depending on the studies programme designed by the correspondent department on case by case basis.

Admissions

Admission into PhD Studies process requires completion of the following stages:

Unalike many other universities, at the SDS applications and admissions process management is centralised at the University’s Admissions Office, a responsibility assigned to the International Office structure of the University. All vacant positions on PhD Studies and Research are submitted by each SDS departments before the University’s Admissions Office, and published by this Office at the University’s website twice a year.

Based on each vacant position’s requirements published, applicants must submit relevant information and basic documents listed for these purposes before Admissions Office at the University’s International Office:

PhD Studies Application Form properly completed, including full programme term financing plan, which must consider reductions from advertised grants’ amountsa assigned to each vacant position;
Certified copies of university diplomas or certificates;
Certified copies of transcripts of university records, including courses taken and mark received (in English or French);
Reading list for university courses;
Copies of relevant written work in the subject application refers to, such as master thesis, major, subject papers, significant term papers, etc.;
Additional information relevant on evaluation of previous studies; and
Short description of plans for doctoral thesis work.

Basics requirements for admission will normally include:

Master degree earned at a university or tuition institution recognised by the EUASC Committee; (equivalent to 300 academic credits / 5 years of full time studies at higher education levels) or acquired essentially corresponding knowledge (exceptionally applied as requirement fulfilment);
Full command of English Language;
University studies must include the subject pursuing to be admitted in to an amount equivalent to a year and half of full time studies;
On the basis of documents enclosed must be found likely to be able to follow successfully the programme to which application refers;
Admissions limited to number of advertised vacant positions as research students and students grants.

Once applicant’s proposal is received, Admissions Office runs prequalification process to select all applicants which basic requirements fulfilment is fully achieved and applicants’ portfolio is packaged by department and discipline.

Each SDS department appoints an Admissions Committee responsible of performing evaluation on applicants’ qualifications and potential; normally Admissions Committee’s include the Chair of Discipline, a Department’s Research Committee’s Delegate, a Research Unit’s Delegate (appointed by the IIU Press and Research Centre) and one Admissions Office’s Delegate.

Evaluation process will normally become one of several tools used by Admissions Committees on evaluation process and general selection criteria applied through applications’ evaluation includes:

Demonstration of other educational or particular professional experience where this is judged to provide the necessary qualification for doctoral studies, regarding the specific subject involved within doctoral programme applied to and general education of importance for that particular subject;
The interview is based on the project description and is intended to provide the Admissions Committee with deeper understanding of applicant’s capacity for research and ability to complete the project;
After the interviews the Committee ranks applicants, presents and votes a proposal for admission to the doctoral programme.

As a result of Admissions Committees work, Admissions Office receives two lists from each Committee: A list of applications admitted and a list of applications declined. Admissions Office will receive final lists from Committees and will establish feed back with applicants, referring to admission or declination results on each case.

Research and PhD Studies agreements will be executed with admitted students and student’s registration requirements list is provided in order to properly install student’s file at Academic Registrar’s Office.

PhD Studies Admissions

Admissions and Contact

Studies System

Though studies system must vary from one Department and from one Discipline to another, general alignments are normally observed by every SDS Department and Discipline.

Practically all PhD Studies Programmes at the SDS involve the following requirements fulfilment:

Four years of full time academic work;
Achievement of 240 academic credits allocation, equivalent to 1,500-1,800 hours of learning workload a year (25 to 30 hours of learning work per academic credit);
An average of 30 academic credits will be allocated on theoretical knowledge achievements and after examination on involved subjects is successfully completed;
An average of 210 academic credits will be allocated on research work, which requires presentation and public defence (viva vocce) of a doctoral thesis, involving 80 weeks of full-time work (or a compendium of several published research papers of highest academic quality on the same subject related to student’s research work, which must be individually presented at symposia, seminars, conferences or academic lectures; either the thesis or all research papers content must become published in the University’s research database);
Doctoral thesis or research papers developed content must, under examiners criteria, imply a relevant contribution to human knowledge on a specific field of management science, economics, engineering, technology, natural science, humanities or social sciences.

The PhD Studies process starts with the Academic Registrar office installs admitted student’s academic dossier and student’s curriculum registration; along the programme’s development the Registrar office will keep programme’s development track and academic activities record and will permanently update student’s curriculum.

The Chair of correspondent discipline will design and agree with student specific programme’s goals and academic general timetable, will appoint student’s Supervisor or Tutor, will assign student into research project and will make all necessary arrangements for student’s financial plan to cover programme’s full-term costs and expenses.

Student’s Supervisor will establish and agree with student, programme’s specifics (activities, timetable and requirements fulfilment), will provide a close follow up on student’s academic needs and activities development, will evaluate quality on student’s academic work, including theoretical and research goals accomplishment, will coach student on research methodology, on theoretical knowledge needed to develop research work and on doctoral thesis preparation, will work closely with Research Committee to evaluate student’s development and contributions to research project of assignment, will provide approval to student’s research presentation, defence and publishing and will file periodical reports on student’s progress, activities track record and relevant information.

As part of programme development, student must attend to seminars, courses, lectures as established on student’s specific academic timetable and perform whatever needed work on theoretical learning is required according to Tutor’s suggestions and for an average of 800 to 900 hours during the programme’s development, which added to research work and research papers or thesis writing will become a total average of 6,000-7,200 hours including learning work, exams approval, publication and public defence approval.

PhD Studies Programme

Thesis Defence

Once student’s Tutor should consider accomplishment of learning goals and of research written papers or thesis highest quality standards, will promote Research Committee’s and Chair of Discipline’s approval, will grant student approval to submit written work before correspondent publishing unit at the IIU Press and Research Centre’s database and will follow up on Examiners Panel assignment by Head of Department and Research Committee.

Student will meet requirements to follow up on work’s publishing and thesis or compendium’s copies distribution to Departments Library, Research Committee and Examiners Panel and will attend, as instructed through Tutor’s intervention and on each Department’s printed instructions, to present and defend doctoral thesis or compendium (viva vocce) before Examiners Panel.

Student must strictly follow instructions on registering and publishing dissertation methodology, as well as instructions and advice documents addressed to postgraduate students regarding defence of doctoral theses published by each department for this purpose. Registration process to submit dissertation to defence may take around four months.

Thesis defence is a public event to which anyone interested will be welcome to attend following protocol procedures to which attendants shall be properly instructed. Once dissertation’s public defence has taken place, Examiners Panel will deliberate on defence, considering among other factors, relevance of contribution to human knowledge, derived from research work content, and vote on Pass or Fail basis.

Financing

At the SDS doctoral studies are partly financed by doctoral studentships (up to 75% of total full-term tuition fees) and a doctoral student is thus regarded as an employee of the Institute, as well as a student. Doctoral students are usually required to carry out some coaching at undergraduate level on Studies Validation’s requirements on research work from validation’s applicants. Doctoral studentships are limited to a maximum of four years effective time. Positions are advertised in journals and on the University’s web site. You can also obtain information about positions directly from the department concerned.

In order to become admitted as student at any PhD studies programme in the SDS, applicant must demonstrate financial support from private or public scholarship to cover programme’s full-term costs.

However, the fact that a person has been awarded a scholarship does not automatically guarantee a place as a doctoral student. This decision is taken on an individual basis by the correspondent Head of each Department at the SDS.

Introduction

Admissions

Studies System

Thesis Defence

Financing

Vacant Positions