Faculty Information

The role of the thesis advisor in these projects is much like the role one would have with students working on master’s theses:

• guiding the student to a manageable research question,
• pointing out complexities they do not realize,
• directing them toward resources or literature in the field that they should consider,
• increasing their understanding of the research, creative, and writing conventions of your discipline,
• helping obtain IRB approval when human subjects are used (interviews, surveys, lab experiments, etc.).

Oftentimes, the advisor will need to encourage a student to complete the work. You should establish regular meetings with your honors student (i.e., once a week, once every two weeks) to keep him or her on task, given the other courses and obligations they have. Regular meetings help ensure that the student successfully completes the work before graduation.

You have considerable freedom in how to break down the large project into manageable goals for them. For instance, early in the process, the student might submit a prospectus, conduct a literature review, or learn from more experienced students in a laboratory. Throughout the process, regular meetings with the student can help the student stay focused and progressing. They might have regular writing deadlines throughout the process (which is common in some fields) or write up methods and results near the end of the process (which is common in other fields).

The advisor will typically come from a student’s major. Approval can be given by the Associate Dean for Capstone for an advisor in the student’s minor or otherwise outside the major. All tenured, tenure-track, and research faculty are eligible to serve as advisors. Others might be eligible to serve as advisors, typically with approval from the Associate Dean for Capstone and chair of the relevant department. Staff as well as faculty are sometimes eligible to serve as advisors for project-track capstones, especially if they have a postgraduate degree.

A potential advisor should talk through the Capstone Form with the student. The form will also ask which track the student is on (see the descriptions here). Most students receive course credit while working on their honors capstone, which can count toward graduation requirements, honors hours, and in some cases credit toward the major. Use Commonly Used Courses to determine which courses are most appropriate. When possible, choose one of the listed research or independent study courses in your department for your capstone credit; this way your work on the honors capstone will also help you meet the requirements of your major. We can also use HON 301, 302, 401, and 402, but these should be considered only when an appropriate course in your major is not available or if you are on the project track. Then sign and date the form for the student to submit to the Honors College at hococapstone@olemiss.edu.

In the semester they plan to defend (which is often the semester they graduate, but can be earlier), they will have additional deadlines from the honors college. These include alerting the Honors College of their intention to defend, submitting a complete draft submitted to you, sending a defensible version of the written portion to the entire committee at least ten days before the defense, scheduling the defense with all the committee members’ availability in mind, and preparing a presentation (typically with a slide deck) and defending the work in a question and answer session, then submitting a corrected version to eGrove. Embargoes are available for work that is under consideration for publication.

For a student to participate in the Honors College Commissioning Ceremony (the Friday before the University Commencement), he/she must defend the thesis by the last day of class in the spring.

The second reader is jointly selected by the advisor and student. Typically, the second reader has an expertise closely related to the advisor’s expertise. They often come from the same department, but they can come from elsewhere. Postdocs, visiting faculty, and others not on a long-term contract with the university are eligible to serve as second readers.

Second readers are sometimes actively involved throughout the process. Sometimes, they are not involved until the very end, when the committee reviews the written portion before the defense. The degree to which the second reader is involved is largely at the discretion of the advisor and student.

Third readers are assigned by the Honors College (with relatively few exceptions, such as Croft committees). Third readers almost always come from outside the advisor’s home department.

They become involved at the end of the process and provide a new set of insights into the student’s work. They are not expected to introduce new standards that would be expected if they had been the advisor. Their suggestions for edits, improvements, and new avenues are generally approached with a spirit of collaboration, support, and quality control. Serving as a third reader is an excellent way to build connections across the university and find how one’s interests link up with work done in other disciplines.

As the professor of record, the advisor has the sole authority to assign the grade for the student’s work. (For international studies majors, the grade is based on Croft guidelines). Whether a course used for capstone credit requires a letter grade or is taken pass/fail is determined by departmental and school guidelines.

If a student has not completed the expected work, it is expected that the faculty member submit a grade of “I” be given until all the requirements are fulfilled. If a student does not plan to complete the expected work and therefore not graduate from the Honors College, the faculty member should assign a grade based on the work actually completed.

The thesis defense is an important requirement. Honors students defend their theses before committees of three faculty: (1) the advisor, (2) the second reader, and (3) the third reader (typically a representative chosen by the Honors College). While the student is responsible for scheduling the defense (working with the faculty members’ schedules), the advisor should not allow a student to defend the thesis if it is not ready.

Students are responsible for finding a place and time for the defense that is acceptable to all committee members. Some defenses are held in the Honors College building, but given the number of honors graduates, most are held in the buildings that house the student’s major department. Any help you and your department can provide in scheduling a room will be appreciated.

For spring defenses, the SMBHC requires that students give final drafts of the written thesis to their readers by April 1 and that the readers have ten days to read the thesis before the defense. (In the fall, final drafts should be submitted by mid-November.) This deadline also allows students to make any major revisions if a reader raises any serious concerns before the defense. Depending on the work you have seen from the student during the course of the thesis, you may want to set an earlier deadline for you to review the thesis before it is distributed to the other readers. We recommend the week before Spring Break for spring defenses.

As soon as possible after the student has submitted the final draft of the thesis, the advisor should contact the other committee members in order to determine if there are any problems that need to be addressed prior to the thesis defense. The advisor and readers will complete an evaluation of the thesis through a Qualtrics survey. As part of those evaluations, the readers will approve whether the student should proceed to the defense.

At the defense, it is the role of the committee to decide whether a student has successfully defended the thesis. Although a staff member from the Honors College is usually present at the defense, the committee alone evaluates the thesis. The committee members alone must approve or decline to approve the thesis. Signing a physical copy of the title page is optional (but is preferred by many students).

Defenses are open to the public. At the beginning of the defense, the advisor may choose to introduce the student. The student then gives a presentation of about 10-20 minutes that highlights the key questions and answers discovered in the production of the thesis. The presentation is followed by questions from the committee and others present. After the question and answer period, the advisor should invite the student and other non-committee members to leave so that the committee can make their final decision. Then, the student is brought back into the room to be told the outcome. Edits to the final version might be required, which could be overseen by the advisor or the whole committee. The entire process typically is finished within an hour.

With the committee evaluation of the thesis described above, we expect that a student will not defend a thesis that is not passable.

All forms, including evaluation forms, are available at the Faculty Portal.

Because of the work the advisor has to do in meeting regularly with students, commenting on early drafts of the thesis, and directing the work of the student, the Honors College will either pay $500 in additional salary to the professor or transfer $600 to the professor’s department for each student. If funds are transferred to the department, the advisor or other faculty may petition the chair to use funds for research expenses, conference travel, or other academic expenses. These funds are a tangible symbol of our appreciation for the extra effort that you will put forth in mentoring honors students through the senior thesis.

When students have successfully completed the requirements of the Honors College and defended the thesis by the last day of classes in the spring, we honor them and their thesis advisors at a commissioning ceremony. During the ceremony, the student receives an Honors College medallion and the thesis advisor gives the student a stole.