Universitat Rovira i Virgili

Bachelor's degree thesis


►Description of the bachelor’s degree thesis

In compliance with the regulations governing university degree programmes, the bachelor's degree programmes of the Faculty of Economics and Business (FEE) include the preparation and defence of a bachelor’s degree thesis. It is a requisite for students to be able to graduate, it is an annual subject and it has a weight of 6 ECTS credits. Those students who are doing two degrees at once or a double degree have to prepare two bachelor’s degree theses.

The bachelor’s degree thesis is an original piece of work produced by individual students that requires them to use all the content taught on the bachelor's degree and the competencies acquired. It can be submitted in Catalan, Spanish or English.

The master's degree thesis must be drafted and submitted by a single student or a group of two students from the same degree programme (and from the same campus if the degree is taught on different campuses).


When a thesis uses data, information or material provided by a collaborating entity that is confidential or subject to industrial and/or commercial secrecy, the URV and the collaborating entity must sign a confidentiality agreement (see the model annexed to the regulations). In this case, the student, the tutor, the members of the examination panel and the thesis coordinator must comply with the stipulations of the agreement and sign the annex.

The bachelor’s degree thesis can be prepared as part of the Service Learning programme, thus combining the student’s learning process with responding to a real need of the community.

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►Regulations governing the bachelor’s degree thesis

Academic Regulations for Bachelor's and Master's Degree Studies, approved by the Governing Council.

Regulations for Enrolment in Bachelor's and Master's Degree Programmes, approved by the Governing Council.

Regulations Governing the Master's Degree Thesis at the FEE.

To safeguard the quality of bachelor’s degree theses, the FEE has its own regulations, approved by the Faculty Board and based on the URV’s framework regulation.

The process of the bachelor’s degree thesis is described in the faculty’s Internal System of Quality Assurance (SIGQ) PR-FEE019 GESTIÓ DEL TFG . Our desire to improve our students’ education means that the master’s degree coordinator and the dean’s staff are constantly making new proposals for improvement and reviewing the whole process.

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►Enrolment and examination

Students must enrol for their master's degree thesis in compliance with the requirements established in the URV regulations for Enrolment in Bachelor's and Master's Degree Programmes and the Regulations Governing the Master's Degree Thesis at the FEE.

To be able to enrol for a bachelor’s degree thesis, students must have passed the number of credits stipulated by the Academic Regulations for Bachelor’s and Master’s Degree Studies, currently 70% of the credits of the degree.

The bachelor’s degree thesis can be submitted and defended in June or September in the periods scheduled.

First call: June. The first call is scheduled in the academic calendar for the month of June. Nevertheless, Students can request the June call to be brought forward to January, in compliance with the stipulations of the URV's Regulations for Enrolment in Bachelor's and Master's Degree Programmes. the head of the degree programme must consider the request and inform the faculty secretary of his/her decision. Should no request be received, the student will be examined in the first call in June.

Second call: September. Those students who do not pass the subject in the first call (in either January or June) will be able to be examined in the second call in September. The September call cannot be brought forward to June.

The bachelor's degree thesis can’t be enrolled in the extraordinary period of January neither it’s possible to ask an additional examination.

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►Information about the bachelor’s degree thesis

The academic calendar for bachelor's degrees at the FEE, approved by the Faculty Board, sets the periods in which a master's degree can be defended (first call brought forward to February, first call in June and second call in September) and the information is published in the degree's course guide, available on the faculty's website.

At the beginning of the academic year, the coordinator of the bachelor’s degree thesis calls the students enrolled on the subject to an information session. The session is announced by email and published on Moodle and the FEE website. During the session the students are told about the features of a bachelor’s degree thesis.

After the session, the coordinator will publish all the information students require on Moodle, together with the schedules of deadlines and evaluation for each of the exam sessions (February, June and September) (which will include dates, times and places for submitting the thesis, dates for the thesis defence, the publication of grades, etc.).
 

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►Application and proposal

The FEE’s website hosts the computer application TFGFEE by which thesis topics and tutors can be proposed and assigned. During the information session, the thesis coordinator explains how and when students have to make their online proposal for the topic area of their thesis. Every degree has a separate application form.

The form students have to send lists the topic areas as well as all the tutors assigned to each topic area. Students have to complete and send the online form with the following information:

Student’s personal information

Topic areas for the bachelor’s degree thesis in order of preference.

Whether they wish to do the thesis individually or as a member of a group (2 students).

Whether they wish to draft and defend the thesis in English.

The TFGFEE assigns students to a topic area on the strength of the average grade of their academic transcript, their preferences and the number of theses per area stipulated by the departments. For those theses done by two students, their individual grades are averaged.

If students do not submit their application before the deadline, they will have to speak to the coordinator of the bachelor’s degree thesis (tfg.fee@urv.cat) who will assign one of the topic areas still available.

Finally, the coordinator of the bachelor’s degree thesis sends an email to every student with a personalised link to the TFGFEE application where they can check the topic area and the tutor they have been assigned and whether they will be able to draft and defend their thesis in English. From this point on, students can get in touch with their tutor. The specific topic of the bachelor’s degree thesis must be agreed by the tutor and the student. Students can make a proposal as long as it is within the topic area assigned. They must write a thesis that deals with the topic area assigned. If they do not, it will be understood that they have decided to forego tutoring and they will be given a grade of zero for the evaluation of the tutor. Under no circumstances will they be assigned a new topic area or tutor. Tutors act as facilitators of student learning although the responsibility for drafting and submitting the thesis is the student’s.

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►Preparation and submission of the thesis

Students must submit all the documentation listed in the document “Schedule and instructions for submitting and evaluating the bachelor’s degree thesis”, which is available on Moodle. Once submitted, the thesis will be added to the URV’s institutional repository, where it will be deposited and displayed in accordance with the guidelines laid down in the URV's framework regulations governing master's degree theses.

The periods during which bachelor's degree theses can be defended are set in the FEE's academic schedule for bachelor's degrees and also included in the Course Guide. The defence of a bachelor’s degree thesis is open to the public and must be done in person in the language that the thesis is written in. The date, time and place for the defence of each bachelor’s degree thesis will be published on Moodle.

►Evaluation

Bachelor’s degree theses are evaluated by the tutor and an examination panel, who apply the criteria established in the bachelor’s degree thesis course guide. Grades are always awarded to individual students even if the thesis has been drafted by two students.

Tutors grade theses by following the template of evaluation instructions and entering the grade awarded in the TFGFEE application.

The examination panel consists of a chair, a member and a secretary, all three of whom must be affiliated to the URV's Department of Business Management and/or Department of Economics but who have not been tutors of the students to be evaluated. A single grade is awarded by the panel and all members must be in agreement. The examination panel grades the student’s thesis and the defence by following the template of evaluation for the panel and the panel’s chair is responsible for entering the students’ grades into Moodle.

Total or partial plagiarism means that the thesis will be awarded the grade of fail (zero).

The coordinator of the bachelor’s degree thesis is responsible for completing the examination records for every examination session and degree by entering the grade from the TFGFEE application. On the date set for each examination session, students can check the final grade on their academic transcript and the components of the grade on the TFGFEE application.
 

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►Satisfaction surveys

During the bachelor's degree thesis, the following surveys and questionnaires must be completed.

For students:

Survey of satisfaction with the information session.

Survey of satisfaction with the bachelor’s degree thesis.

For tutors:

Survey of satisfaction with the information session.

Satisfaction survey for tutors of bachelor’s degree theses.
 

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