Submission Deadlines

• 15 May (Spring semester)
• 15 December (Fall semester)

If the deadline is on an official holiday, a Saturday, or a Sunday, the deadline is extended to the next working day.

Format requirements

The thesis should be written in English and presented as a PDF file, ideally formatted with:

• A4 page size;
• 12 points easy-to-read font (Times New Roman, Arial, or similar);
• margins of at least 2.5 cm;
• line spacing between 1 and 1.15 points.

The thesis should not exceed 19 000 words including tables, figure captions and footnotes, but excluding the table of contents, acknowledgements, references, and appendices.

The thesis should include the URL of a related MCT blog post which integrates the accompanying material such as video, audio, source code, data, high-resolution images, etc.

The title page of the thesis should contain the following information:

• title of the thesis;
• candidate’s name;
• name of the department and university;
• the following text: “Master’s programme in Music, Communication and Technology”;
• month and year of submission.

The title page of the thesis should follow UiO’s guidelines and recommendations.

The thesis should contain an abstract of maximum 200 words, briefly describing the project, background, aim, methods, and conclusion. It should be written as plain text and in one paragraph and be placed on a separate page after the title page and before the table of contents.

Templates, formatting guidelines and other useful resources are available on both UiO and NTNU websites.

Supervision and Topic

All candidates need to have a supervisor employed by the Department of Musicology at UiO or by the Department of Music of NTNU. During the execution of the thesis, the candidate can get up to 13.5 hours of direct counseling from the supervisor.

Candidates should attend thesis workshops organized in the semesters prior to enrolling in MCT4090. The workshops help candidates in developing a thesis topic, in drafting a preliminary proposal, and in identifying supervisors. The supervisor allocation is mediated by the MCT Programme Leader.

• Candidates aiming to complete the thesis at the end of the Spring semester must submit the supervision agreement by October 15 and the thesis proposal by December 15.
• Candidates aiming to complete the thesis at the end of the Fall semester must submit the supervision agreement by March 15 and the thesis proposal by May 15.

If the above deadlines are on an official holiday, a Saturday, or a Sunday, the deadlines are extended to the next working day.

UiO-based candidates should compile and submit the supervision agreement form online. NTNU-based candidates should compile the supervision agreement form and send it via email to the student consultant and to the supervisor. Thesis proposal submission is via the MCT4090 site on Canvas.

Support

Further support on development of thesis topic, academic writing and referencing are available on both UiO and NTNU websites. For further support you can contact the UiO academic writing center or the NTNU viko.

Ethics and Data Protection

Ethical guidelines for carrying out and publishing research work are available on both UiO and NTNU - [broken link] websites. Additional guidelines are available on the website of the Norwegian National Research Ethics Committees - [error], including links to subject-specific guidelines. Guidelines for appropriate collection and storage of data are also available on both UiO and NTNU websites. These are consistent and aligned with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

All thesis work including collection of personal data and/or experiments with subjects must be reported to Norwegian Centre for Research Data (NSD) at least 30 days before the data collection starts. NSD will assess whether the data is subject to notification, and if the planned data collection and data processing procedures are satisfactory. More information can be found on the NSD website. NSD does not give an ethical approval of a project, they only assess the data management and whether data are collected in a way that secures personal privacy.

Submission

Candidates are eligible to submit their thesis at the end of the semester only if they have registered for the course MCT4090. Registration is via Studentweb of the institution in which the candidate is based and must be completed before the respective deadline (UiO Studentweb, NTNU Studentweb, UiO Deadlines, NTNU Deadlines). To register, a candidate must have completed all other MCT courses in the previous semester. 

The PDF file and a Zip file with all attached material (audio, video, images, source code, etc.) of the thesis must be submitted electronically through the system of the institution in which the candidate is based:

• UiO-based candidates must submit the thesis via UiO Inspera as well as in the open research archive DUO following these instructions.
• NTNU-based candidates must submit thesis via NTNU Inspera only following these instructions, addition to the open research archive is automatic. 

On both system, candidates can opt to delay the online availability as well as restrict the open access to their thesis in case it includes sensitive data or non-disclosable material. In most cases the material will be made available immediately.

The submission should ideally be done well ahead of the final deadline, to allow sufficient time to solve technical errors, and ensure that the associated MCT blog post has been created by the time of submission.

The electronic version of the thesis is considered complete. There is no need to print out the thesis.

A thesis can be revised and re-submitted only if the previous version was graded as failed. A thesis can only be revised and resubmitted once. The deadline for re-submission is the next official deadline for submission. The procedure for re-submission is the same as described above. The revised thesis is generally reviewed by the same examiners that assessed the original thesis. 

Assessment

The thesis is examined by two experts in the field of study, one internal (within UiO or NTNU) and one external (academia or industry).

The grades will be released via Studentweb within 3 months after the submission deadline.

Explanation of the grades will be provided in a video conference between the candidate and the examiners. Candidates will be contacted by the student consultant to arrange an appointment with the examiners.

Examiners assess the thesis with respect to the following criteria:

• research question(s), objective(s) and limitation(s) of the study;
• critical review of relevant literature;
• explanation of methodology and theoretical justification of framework or design choices;
• originality of thesis contributions;
• depth of critical reflection with respect to the field of specialization;
• discussion of results and possible continuation of the work;
• structure and layout of the thesis, use of academic language, citations and referencing.