PhD thesis examination: overview report on an ARC Discovery Grant project 2003-06

The PhD is clearly the pinnacle of formal qualifications in our education system representing excellence and attracting both resources and prestige to universities. Candidates are highly valued in their institutions and hold a privileged position. In turn the expectation is that their projects will provide an original and significant research outcome, in the form of a thesis. For Australian PhDs, normally the only assessment made is through the medium of written reports on the thesis by either two or three external examiners. The examiners effectively set PhD standards. It was the content of the examiner reports in providing indicators of thesis quality that was the major focus of this study. These reports were linked with candidature and examiner information to provide background information thought to be relevant to the thesis examination process.