How-to-Write-a-Better-Thesis

136 11 Before You Submit
Glossary
If you have a glossary, it is customarily placed at the end, after all the appendices.
In other theses, it is placed near the lists of tables and figures, which may be part of
the table of contents.
And don’t forget: Your thesis needs to consist of your work, not other people’s.
If you have text that is drawn from papers that are co-authored with others, make
sure that they understand that it is being used in your thesis. Only include figures
and tables if you have permission to do so; if you are not the author of a figure, you
must ask the authors and publisher if you can use it. If you have access to a tool
for checking for plagiarism, consider using it. If you are including material from
papers you have written, it should be material you were responsible for; if one of
your co-authors wrote a section without significant input from you, then it should
not become part of your thesis.
Summary of Chapter 11: Before You Submit
When your supervisor has ‘signed off’ on every chapter of your thesis you have
only finished the first draft of your thesis. You still have two major tasks ahead of
you: checking the structure and checking the detail.
From first draft to second draft:
• Check the structure of the thesis as a whole.
• Read it through in detail yourself. Check the logic flow. Look for gaps in the
logic, repetitions, things in the wrong order. Fix these up to the best of your
ability.
• Then (and only then) ask your supervisor to do the same. If possible, find a friend
whose opinions you can rely on but who is unfamiliar with your topic to do the
same. Fix up the problems they identify.
Checking the details:
• You now must check to ensure that you have done everything properly. A checklist
is given in this chapter; you can find other such checklists online. Depending
on how systematic you have been earlier, this task may take several weeks. Allow
time for it in your thesis completion schedule.
• Be professional. Do not use material that is not your own without proper citation,
and be aware of ethical concerns that lie at the core of academic research.