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Services for Final Year Students: Using the Thesis Template

Thesis template

The Thesis template is a set of guidelines developed to help you formatting your thesis, rather than something you have to follow.

You are encouraged to use the thesis template from the beginning in order to save time formatting your thesis.

If you don't like it, you can change it!

Formatting the Thesis

Your thesis must be formatted according to the requirements specified by your Department.

 

Overall layout

The Guidelines do not require any specific formatting for the general layout. You can easily follow the Thesis template layout by downloading the template file, or you can use the following recommendations.

 

Margins

The Thesis template follows these margins specifications:

  • 1" top, bottom, left and right

 

Pagination

All pages with the exception of the front page should be numbered.

Roman numeral are used for the preliminary pages.

The pagination starts at 1 with the Introduction.

 

Font

There are no specific requirement for the font. The Thesis template uses Time New Roman, but you can a font of your choice. Font size is usually 12 points.

 

Line spacing

The body of your thesis should double-spaced.

 

Headings

All pages with a heading must correspond with the headings and page numbers in the Table of Contents. If you use the Thesis template this will be done automatically.

Thesis Content

Here are all the sections you should include in your thesis:

 

  • Front page: this is the cover page of your thesis, where you include information such as the title, your name, your major, your readers
  • Abstract: this is a brief summary of the thesis, including the initial research question, the methods of investigation used, and the general conclusions. It is usually not longer that one page.
  • Dedication (optional)
  • Acknowledgements (optional)
  • Table of contents: this is the list of all the sections included in your thesis (chapters, bibliography, appendixes)
  • List of figures: this is the list of all the images that you include in your work. It is not necessary if you only have a few of images.
  • List of tables: this is the list of all your tables, charts, graphs, and similar.
  • List of abbreviations: in this list you can have all the acronyms disambiguated. It allows to start using the abbreviation from the very beginning without worrying about giving the explanation of what they stand for.
  • Introduction: this is the first chapter of your thesis but it is usually written at the end.
  • Chapters: the number of chapter varies and it depends on your research.
  • Conclusions: this is the last chapter of your thesis.
  • Bibliography: this is the list of all the sources that you used in your thesis. The citation style you use depends on the discipline, but you can also discuss it with your readers.
  • Appendix: this section is for additional material that you want to include in your thesis. It is not counted as part of the thesis per se, therefore you should be careful in using appendixes.

 

Sections in red are mandatory, the others are optional.