Page 23 - Tallinn University Study Regulations 2015 ENG

final thesis. A final thesis shall be uploaded to the plagiarism identification system for control purposes.
(13)A student shall submit a final thesis, (digitally) signed by the student and the supervisor, and register for the defence in the ÕIS. All final theses shall be submitted electronically in PDF format and on paper if the academic unit makes a request for it. The Council of the academic unit may give to the curator of the study programme the right to allow a final thesis to defence. A signature of the supervisor/curator of the study programme confirms that the final thesis is allowed to proceed to defence. A student certifies by his or her signature that, the thesis is in compliance with the ethical requirements; permission is granted to reproduce the thesis make the thesis available to the public; and that it may be used in the plagiarism identification system as a data source. (14)After registering for the defence of a final thesis, a student has the possibility to apply for deletion from the registration list but no later than one day prior to the defence and only for justifiable circumstances (e.g. illness or accident).
(15)An assessment of a final thesis is given in a written review that follows the requirements established by the academic unit. The review contains a recommendation for assigning a grade only, if the defence of a thesis does not take place. The review must be submitted to the academic unit no later than three days prior to the defence. The student has the right to see the review of his/her final thesis no later than one day prior to the defence.
(16)Conflict of interest shall be avoided in appointing a reviewer. If the supervisor finds that the reviewer does not have sufficient professional competence for reviewing a specific thesis, the supervisor shall submit a relevant application to the curator of the study programme, within one day after the appointment of the reviewer.
(17)The defence of final theses shall take place in public before a defence committee during an examination session (except for doctoral theses). The defence may be declared closed if a thesis contains information that cannot be made public due to author´s property rights belonging to other people, the Personal Data Protection Act, a state or commercial secret or due to other confidential information in the thesis. The Director of the academic unit shall declare the defence closed by his or her order and restrict access to the thesis. (18)It is recommended that the reviewer and supervisor participate in the defence. Conducting a defence procedure via video bridge is allowed only in exceptional cases, on the basis of a justified application by the student. The Director of the academic unit shall make a decision on the proposal for a chairman of the defence committee.
(19)At least 2/3 of the members of the defence committee shall participate in the defence. The defence committee will determine the final grade, based on the written final paper and the academic discussion that took place at the defence.
(20)The Council of the academic unit may decide that at Bachelor’s level, the defence shall not take place. In this case the supervisor and reviewer shall write an assessment and give a recommendation for a grade. The defence committee shall decide the final grade based on the assessments of the supervisor and the reviewer and also the student´s response. If the Council of the academic unit decides that the defence shall not take place, the student shall be informed of this no later than during the intermediate week of the semester of the defence. A student has the right to a public defence of the final thesis. For this the student shall submit an application to the academic unit one month prior to the deadline for submitting final theses.
(21)Students shall be informed of the results of the defence on the day of defence, immediately after the preparation of protocols. The grades shall be entered using a standard protocol, which shall be signed by the chairman of the defence committee and the person recording the grades.