THESIS AND

DISSERTATION
WRITING
 Research
Commissioned Researches
Projects
The Knowledge Awareness Assessment on Road Safety for Children
Program
Farmers’ Satisfaction Survey
Cities and Municipalities Competitiveness Index
Citizen Satisfaction Index System
Revisiting the Implementation of Special Curricular Programs in Region
IVA – CALABARZON
Current Research Involvement with BatStateU
Transportation Research for Assessment of its Network, Safety, Policy and
Optimization (TRANSPO) Program
All About Writing Theses and
Dissertations
• Reasons to do a thesis
• Choosing your topic
• Preparing a thesis proposal
• Writing and revising a thesis
• Defending a thesis
• Preparing publications based on a thesis
 Preliminary Questions
Experience
Have you written a thesis or dissertation?
Are you writing a thesis or dissertation?
Have you supervised a thesis or dissertation?
Materials
Guidelines
Proposals
Drafts
Other
Now let’s get started!
Reasons to Do a Thesis
 Some Reasons to Do a Thesis
To gain an advanced academic degree (for career advancement,
prestige, or other reasons)
To develop skill in doing research
To see whether one likes doing research
To develop skill in writing about research
To become versed in the literature in one’s field
To become a more informed user of research
Other
Choosing Your Topic
 Some Characteristics of a Good
Thesis Topic
Greatly interests the person doing the thesis
Otherwise, too hard to stay motivated
One should be truly enthusiastic about the topic
Is of interest and importance to others in the field
Is likely to result in publishable work
Is large enough to be meaningful
Is small enough to be doable
Other
 Possible Sources of Topic
Books, Research Gate, Google Scholar
Work/Company
Industry/Community
Research Project involvement
Government agencies/International organizations
Subject requirement
Theses/Dissertation
Journal
Search engines
 Preliminaries
Before proposing a thesis topic, review the literature relating to it.
Doing so can help you to
Identify unanswered research questions
See methods used
Otherwise develop context for your research
 Refining Thesis Topics
Often the topics first proposed are too big.
Don’t worry if it takes a lot of work to refine your thesis topic. That’s
common, and the time spent refining a thesis topic is a good
investment.
Work with your advisory committee, and especially your chair, to
refine your thesis topic.
In particular, come up with good research questions—for they are the
foundation for a good thesis.
Preparing a Thesis Proposal
 Benefits of Writing a Thesis
Proposal
Helps ensure that the research is planned thoroughly
Allows feedback before doing the research
Helps ensure that committee members have consistent expectations
Serves as a first step in drafting the thesis
Provides practice in writing proposals
Other
 The Big Picture: Thesis Proposal
Your proposal describes your proposed plan of work:
What you intend to study (scope and research questions).
How you intend to study your topic (methodology).
Why this topic needs to be studied (significance).
When you will complete this work (timeline).
(Occasionally) Where you will conduct this work.
 Proposal: A Piece of Persuasive
Writing
Your thesis proposal should persuade your
committee that
Your topic is good.
Your methods are suitable.
You are prepared to embark on the research.
 Typical Structure of a Thesis
Front matter
Title page
Abstract
Table of contents

Core: chapters
Back matter
References
Appendixes
 The Thesis-Writing Process
Establishing the Mindset
Don’t view writing a thesis as a hurdle to
overcome. Rather, view it as preparation for
writing throughout your career. Remember that
you are writing to communicate, not to impress.
 The Thesis-Writing Process
Preparing to Write
Find and analyze some good theses in your field.
Use them as models.
When ideas occur to you while gathering
information, put them in files corresponding to
sections of your thesis.
Do lots of “pre-writing”.
 The Thesis-Writing Process
Drafting the Thesis
Make writing a part of your schedule or routine.
Break the task into manageable parts.
Start drafting parts of your thesis while still
gathering data
 The Thesis-Writing Process
Revising the Thesis
Realize that revising is an integral part of doing a
thesis.
In revising, strive to make your writing
Clear
Correct
Concise
Consistent
But don’t revise forever. No piece of writing is perfect. Be
A Note on Thesis Format
Defending a Thesis
Preparing a Publications Based
on a Thesis