Scheduling final oral defenses
Students are advised to contact their department for guidelines regarding scheduling their final oral defense.
Note: The requirement for limiting the number of remote participants in defenses was suspended during the pandemic to allow defenses to be held entirely virtually. The regular attendance requirements at final oral defenses have been reinstated for defenses held after September 2022, as outlined in the Faculty of Graduate Studies “Guidelines on attendance at major paper, thesis, and dissertation defenses".
Resources for remote participation at defenses
At their discretion departments may allow remote participants at defenses within the “Guidelines on attendance at major paper, thesis, and dissertation defenses", provided they have measures to minimize distractions (e.g. restrict remote audience participation to the presentation portion only, no video, mute all microphones, ensure defense chair moderates remote participation, etc.). CTL proviodes resources for hybrid meetings (in person plus live streaming). Refer also to:
Post-defense procedures
- Instructions for departments: obtaining electronic signatures on the Report form for a major paper/ thesis/ dissertation defense.
- Instructions for students: post-defense steps of the final submission (deposit) are to be completed by the student online or via email as per the deposit steps instructions. Review guidelines about obtaining electronic signatures from committee members on the Approval form.