Assignments 📑

Task

You will prepare a proposal for your master’s thesis, thereby going through a complete process of writing and publishing an academic paper (topic, strategy, narrative, review, revision, presentation).

You need to apply what you have learned and create multiple deliverables. The deliverables are usually created during a writing and publication cycle. In addition, you get feedback from both, your peer students as well as the Professors.

The deliverables reflect your learning progress and are graded individually.

Deliverables

You need to deliver following parts via Moodle:

• Extended proposal (initial version) for your master thesis (details see template)
• Two reviews of fellow students’ proposal (details see template)
• Revision of your proposal incl. response letter (details see template)
• Lessons learned (1 page reflection; append it to your revision)

For deadlines, pelase see the schedule

Grading

The exam parts are graded individually and are included in the overall grade with the following proportions:

• 30% extended proposal,
• 30% reviews,
• 30% revision, and
• 10% lessons learned

Note: Compliance with formal requirements (see templates) and good scientific practice are critical pass criteria for all parts, means that in case of non-compliance the exam is automatically failed (e.g., plagiarism, even light forms).

Extended proposal

An proposal that fulfills expectations has the following characteristics

• The proposal is well-structured
• The thesis proposal is well aligned to the audience and testifies professionalism
• The author shows sophisticated use of a well-chosen vocabulary relevant to the topic
• The writing style, tone and word choice is appropriate and consistent
• Rules and conventions concerning technical aspects of writing are fulfilled
• There are no doubts concerning the relevance of the research
• The research gap is outlined and well substantiated
• The research question follows logically and makes sense
• All core terms are introduced and clearly defined
• The references to the current literature are clearly shown
• The theory is well inferred and comprehensible
• The research design well aligned to aims and comprehensible
• The expected contributions to literature and practice are outlined

Reviews

The reviews are scored by the authors of the paper reviewed using following criteria

• The reviews help the author to improve his/her work (developmental)
• The recommendations are consistent
• The recommendations make sense
• The recommendations reflect sufficient knowledge of the topic (i.e., depth)
• Strengths and criticisms are clearly, but politely stated

Note: We also have a look at the reviews and check if the scoring is adequate. If not, we adjust the scoring and the peer reviewer might get a grade malus

Revisions

The revision including the response document are scored by us using following criteria:

• The response is complete
• The responses are comprehensible (well justified)
• The comments are well implemented
• The paper has significantly improved

Lessons learned

A summary of lessons learned that fulfills expectations has the following characteristics

• The learning progress is thoroughly reflected
• The lessons learned are plausible