Graduate Catalog 2022-2023

Electronic Attendance Policy

Doctoral students’ oral comprehensive, proposal and final dissertation/doctoral scholarly project defense examinations require the attendance of the student, all committee members, including the faculty representative, external and honorary members. Attendance, for the purpose of this policy, is defined as either a physical/in-person presence on campus or an electronic presence (e.g., telephone/conference call, video conferencing [Skype ®, Facetime®] or other online meeting platform.

  • Electronic attendance by the student or committee members assume the technology is viable and works continuously throughout the examination of the student.
  • Should the technology fail or be disrupted in any committee meeting (orals, proposal, or final dissertation/doctoral scholarly project defense) in excess of 15 minutes the Research Advisor and/or Faculty Rep must contact the Graduate School and reschedule the examination for a later date. In such cases, the student will not be subject to the two-week period required for public announcement of the examination. If the examination continues with failed technology for more than 15 minutes, the results will not be accepted by the Graduate School and the student will need to reschedule and will be subject to the two-week period for public announcement.
  • No more than two persons, either two committee members or the student and committee member may attend dissertation proposal or doctoral scholarly project defense electronically.
  • No more than two committee members may attend the oral comprehensive or dissertation/doctoral scholarly project defense electronically.