Committee Process And Guidelines
The MLA program culminates in the Master’s Thesis. Students may do either (A) a traditional Thesis (approximately 50-100 pages or more in length and including a separate Bibliography), or (B) a creative Thesis/Project which includes a critical essay. Whichever option a student chooses, a thesis may evolve out of a class, paper or project a student has pursued during his or her MLA studies (typically after a student has completed about 20-22 credits in the MLA Program). Students are asked to form an MLA Thesis committee, with one MLA faculty agreeing to be the Thesis director (see Committee Process and Guidelines below).
During the process of writing the thesis or creative project, students and their thesis director should communicate regularly and meet in a timely fashion with their committee to get constructive feedback, critiques, motivation, and advice about completing a successful Thesis.
MLA Committee Process & Guidelines
MLA students are strongly encouraged to form a thesis committee at least one semester prior to graduation.
MLA Thesis committees consist of one MLA faculty as Chair or Thesis Director, two additional faculty (who teach in the MLA Program), and one “outside” faculty. Either the student or his or her committee Chair may ask faculty if they wish to serve on the committee.
Committee Chairs work closely with the student and faculty to coordinate meetings and get all appropriate forms and signatures to the Graduate Office by official deadlines (see Graduate Studies webpage: http://www.mnstate.edu/graduate/)
It is strongly recommended that an MLA Committees meet three times.
• The first meeting should be to discuss and give feedback for the student’s Thesis Proposal.
• The second meeting should be to discuss and give feedback for the Thesis rough draft.
• The third and final meeting should be the Oral Discourse/Defense for the final draft of the Thesis.
Prior to the first face-to-face meeting of the committee members with the student, the student will prepare their detailed prospectus and bibliography and provide a draft to all committee members with copies of this prospectus and bibliography. This should be at least two or more weeks before the first committee meeting so members can review the materials thoroughly and give the student feedback.
After that initial meeting and all other meetings, it is the student’s responsibility to work closely with their Thesis director to incorporate the committee’s suggestions and advice into the successive rough drafts that the student will write. Should the student choose not to do so, he/she should be aware that it is within the committee’s rights to reject a thesis that has not been revised satisfactorily. Likewise, a committee may accept the final draft and suggest minor revisions.
Students and committee members should have a minimum of three face-to-face meetings (see #4 above). Given the difficulties of scheduling, committee members should feel free to communicate individually with the student in a variety of ways via phone conferences or e-mail, to provide verbal & written feedback that helps the student shape their Thesis project. ALL committee members, not simply the chair, should feel free to discuss the student’s thesis with the student in detail. It is acceptable for committee members to provide advice via email, but to avoid duplicated effort, this should be copied to the entire thesis committee.
In any cases in which two or more committee members disagree in their direction and/or evaluation of a student’s thesis, the chair shall mediate between them to resolve their differences.
Please see the Sample Prospectus link for Thesis proposal models.
