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Confirmation of Status Guidance

All DPhil students must complete a Confirmation of Status process. This should ideally be completed in the 8th term and must be completed by the end of the 9th term (18th term for part time students) after admission.

Purpose

The purpose of the confirmation process is to determine if you will be in a position to submit for examination in due course. This process should help you to bring your research together and prepare for writing up. It should also flag where plans for completion are not suitable and provide additional guidance to help you modify the plans and ensure a successful completion.

Procedure

  1. Student and supervisor discuss potential assessors. Supervisor contacts potential assessors to ask if they would be willing to act as assessor and, if so, to arrange a date and time. Two assessors are required, neither of whom should have acted in a supervisory capacity (formal or informal) to the student. Both assessors should be internal to Oxford (but can be from outside of the Department) and at least one assessor should have supervised a student in Oxford to completion. It is a good idea to do this well in advance of the confirmation so that the assessors have plenty of notice. You can have the same or different assessors to those you had for your transfer.
  2. Student completes the online application (GS014 form). This is an online form, which can be accessed via the My Student Record tab in Student Self Service. Once submitted online, this form will then be sent to supervisors to add comments, names of assessors and signatures and then to the Director of Graduate Studies and college for signature. This should be completed at least 2 weeks before the assessment.
  3. As part of the GSO.14 form, students should upload the following documents:
    1. Thesis contents list (1-2 pages with chapter titles, headings and sub-headings where appropriate)
    2. Milestones of any remaining work to be undertaken/dates for the submission of draft chapters to the supervisor (could be presented as a Gantt chart)
    3. Completed Training Needs Assessment.
  4. Once the viva date/time has been arranged, the supervisor/student should email graduatestudies@psych.ox.ac.uk to inform them of the date and assessors, so that the relevant forms and information can be sent to the assessors. It is important to do this well in advance of the viva so that assessors are given access to the documents in good time.
  5. Graduate Studies Administrator grants assessors access to documents on the system and send assessment sheet and assessor instructions to the assessors in advance of the assessment.
  6. At the assessment, the student presents their project and plans for completion to the assessors, and this is followed by questions from the assessors.
  7. After the assessment, the assessors upload the assessment sheet and any comments to the system to go to Medical Sciences Division for final approval. The Division send out confirmation of the result to the student, supervisors, college and department.

The deadline for this entire process to be complete is the end of your 9th term (18th term for part time students). 

To be submitted in advance


In advance of the assessment, you should upload the following to your GSO.14:

  • A thesis contents list (1-2 pages) that shows that you have given some thought to the structure of your thesis and should include sub-headings for each chapter.
  • Milestones to completion of outstanding work, with dates for when draft chapters will be sent to the supervisors for comment. This should include justification of the time estimated for each chapter.
  • Training Needs Assessment: research training is a key component of the DPhil career and the TNA should detail the training you have received in subject-specific and generic research skills.

The presentation and interview

Your supervisor must not be present at the oral assessment. At the start of your assessment, you will be asked to present an overview of the research that you have conducted during your DPhil. This will be followed by questions from your assessors. Typically, the confirmation interview lasts around one hour, and must be no longer than two hours.

After the interview

Following the interview, the assessors upload a report/recommendation to the online system (through evision), which goes to the Medical Sciences Graduate Studies Office. The recommendation reported by the assessors will be based on the information provided in the GSO.14 and in the supplementary information from you in conjunction with your presentation and interview.

The Medical Sciences Board's decision on the assessors’ recommendation will usually be available 2-3 weeks following submission of the GSO.14 and assessors' recommendation to the divisional Graduate School Assistants. The decision will be communicated to you by email.

If your 1st application for confirmation of status is not approved, you will be permitted to make one further application, following the procedures detailed above, normally within one term of the original application and will be granted an extension of time for one term (i.e. if you made your 1st attempt to confirm in your 9th term, you will be granted an extension until the end of your 10th term to complete your 2nd attempt to confirm). Ideally, there should be a gap of at least three months between completing your confirmation of status and submitting your thesis. You should refer to the Research Degree Examinations section of the MSD Canvas site for full guidance on submitting your thesis. 

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