IV. DEADLINES AND ASSESSMENT
Timetable
The student and his or her advisor together will arrange a suitable timetable in which the student will be able to complete satisfactorily the I.S. Thesis. The following is a general timetable that will serve as a guideline:
Week
1 Choice of topic; formulation of thesis to be investigated;
preliminary bibliographic search.
2-3 Completion of bibliography; general outline of thesis; plan of research and study.
4-10 Research ending with a detailed outline of thesis.
11-15 Completion of first draft, including documentation.
16-20 Completion of final draft
For regulations concerning the deadlines for submission of the I.S. Thesis the student is referred to the Handbook for Independent Study.
Oral presentations
You will likely be expected to present a ten-minute oral presentation of your work in progress at the end of the fall semester. These presentations may take place as part of the Department's Classics Forum. Your talk should be accompanied by visual aids such as slides or a handout and should provide a general introduction to your project and a rough forecast of future directions for your work. Students have generally found the responses of sympathetic audiences very helpful in revising and expanding the thesis in the spring semester.
Critique and Defense
After the final copy of the I.S. Thesis is submitted to the Registrar's Office, the student will be expected to present a successful defense of his or her paper. At least one week before this defense the student will receive a critique of the thesis, normally written by the second reader, which will evaluate the thesis according to the criteria of content, method and form. This critique will serve as the starting point of the defense, an oral examination which will be attended by the advisor, the second reader, and other members of the department who so choose. The defense will cover the thesis itself and the relation of the thesis to the broader questions of the classics.
Shortly after the oral examination, the principal advisor
will provide a final and detailed critique of the entire I.S.
Thesis and will assign a grade of Honors, Good, Satisfactory,
or Unsatisfactory.