Graduate School Format Review & Policies

Your disquisition is a professional document whose appearance should contribute to its readability--and citeability. The NDSU Graduate School reviews the formatting of your disquisition as a penultimate step before it is published, in order to ensure that the formatting of your disquisition matches the standard of quality present in its content and that it meets federal guidelines for digital accessibility.

All other steps required for graduation must be completed before the format review can begin (see: Master's, Doctoral). As you prepare to graduate in your final semester, be mindful of our submission deadlines.

The Format Review Process

Before you submit your disquisition to the Graduate School and begin the format review, your pre-submission requirements should be complete and your disquisition should meet our general requirements for formatting and construction. Microsoft Word templates are available for you to use; we strongly recommend using them to draft your disquisition, as they contain a number of required features for your final document. When you are ready to submit your disquisition, run through our submission checklist and submit your document through our submission portal.

After you have submitted your disquisition, the Disquisition Coordinator will review it based on the Graduate School Format Guidelines and will send you a memo with any required changes. If you need assistance making your corrections, help is available: you may find solutions in our knowledge base, and we encourage you to work with the Center for Writers and Instructional Design Center. On average, students who work with a graduate consultant require one fewer review.

The Graduate School does not review disquisitions for their written content; as such, your disquisition must be complete, with all content edits finalized, before you begin the review process. If you make significant changes to the content of your disquisition after the initial review, your review will be delayed, and you may be required to restart the review process entirely, including paying the processing fee again.

Page Contents

1. The Format Review Process
2. Workshops & Consultations
3. Style Manuals
4. Copyright
5. Co-authored Materials
6. Previously Published Materials
7. Research Compliance (IRB, IACUC, and IBC)
8. Editing
9. File Format

Timelines & Deadlines

The volume of submissions increases dramatically near the initial submission deadline, and review turnaround time can exceed a week. Students require an average of three reviews to complete the format review process; therefore, we encourage you to begin the format review process early in your final semester and to allocate sufficient time to complete the process after you've submitted.

End-of-semester deadlines can be found on our front page and the NDSU Academic Calendar.

Help is Available: Review Meetings and Disquisition Workshops

In addition to the resources available to you on our website, we highly recommend attending a workshop or meeting with a consultant (or both!) before or during your format review. On average, students require three reviews to complete the process, whereas students who have attended a workshop or meeting with one of our consultants require one fewer review.

One-on-one meetings with graduate consultants are available through the Center for Writers' scheduling portal and the Instructional Design Center's meeting request form. Please note there is a high demand for appointments in the last month of a semester, and availability may be limited. During a meeting, we will work with you directly to help you format your document and can answer any questions you may have regarding the format review process.

The Instructional Design Center also offers frequent workshops on formatting your disquisition. In the final month of semester, the Center for Writers and Instructional Design Center co-host weekly walk-in workshops to help troubleshoot formatting issues; announcements with further details are made through the graduate student listserv and myNDSU.

Copyright

We encourage you to create and use only your own figures, tables, and other content in your document. However, you can include copyrighted material in your disquisition as long as you respect the rights of the copyright holders—even if it's your own published work. If you need to reproduce copyrighted material in your document, the process for obtaining permission is usually simple and straightforward.

• Use of Copyrighted Material – You are responsible for the appropriate use and attribution of copyrighted materials in your disquisition. To better understand ownership, fair use, and your rights and protections, please refer to Copyright and Your Dissertation or Thesis by Kenneth Crews. For example, block quotes most often fall under fair use and do not require permission to reproduce them, whereas reproducing an image does not fall under fair use.
• Respecting Copyright – Reproducing copyrighted material without express written permission violates copyright law. Furthermore, some copyright holders require a specific form of acknowledgment or attribution within the document alongside the reproduced material. If you wish to reproduce material found in academic journals, you can often obtain a license to reproduce these copyrighted materials for free using an automated system from the publisher's website; for example, major publishers will have a link to "request permission" or "get license" on an article's webpage. Materials that have been published in open access formats often require the license the content was published under be included with the reproduced content (e.g. Creative Commons). If written permission to use copyrighted material is required, you are responsible for obtaining permission.
• Copyright and Your Previously Published Work – If you include your previously published work as part of your disquisition, you need to ensure that the publisher has not placed restrictions on your right to reproduce or redistribute this work. This information can usually be found in the publisher’s author guidelines or in the publication contract or transfer agreement. While it's likely that you will have retained permission to reproduce your own work in your disquisition, there may still be additional requirements about how that work is reproduced or published, such as how or where it is attributed.
• Protecting Your Own Copyright – You do not need to register for copyright to hold the copyright; your copyright is created automatically as soon as your work is published, and only in rare cases do we recommend filing for copyright when you submit your disquisition. If you received a stipend, salary, or financial support from NDSU, there may be restrictions on your ability to file for copyright for your disquisition (NDSU Policy Manual, Section 190). Additionally, if you received funding from sources outside of NDSU, you may have other restrictions on your ability to file for copyright for your disquisition imposed by your funding agency.

Research Compliance (IRB, IACUC, and IBC)

The NDSU Policy Manual calls for ethical practices in research. See Section 348.

• For information on research involving human subjects (IRB), see Section 345 of the policy manual.
• For information on research involving animal welfare (IACUC), see Section 346 of the policy manual.
• For information on research involving biosafety (IBC), see Section 347 of the policy manual.

After your supervisory committee has finalized your research design, you must submit the appropriate forms to the IRB, IACUC, or IBC for review. You must receive research approval before you begin the research.

If your research involves the use of human or animal subjects or biohazardous substances and you do not have the requisite IRB, IACUC, or IBC approval, your disquisition will not be accepted by the Graduate School. IRB, IACUC, and IBC approval cannot be obtained retroactively.

At the time of your final defense, all students must submit the IRB/IACUC/IBC Compliance Notification form to the Graduate School, regardless of whether you used human or animal subjects in your research.

Note: For the security of your personal identity, do not include in your disquisition the IRB/IACUC/IBC Compliance Notification form or any other paperwork containing your student ID number or other personally identifying information, such as your phone number or email address.