When you think forward to the end of your PhD, you’ll likely focus on submitting your thesis and attending your viva. What you may not have considered is the likely need to make corrections based on feedback from your examiners.
While it’s possible to pass your viva with no revisions at all, the vast majority of us will need to make some corrections before we’re completely done with the PhD. Most often these will be minor corrections. However, all of the advice in this post can also be applied to major corrections, alongside other protocols which you should be alerted to by your examiners, supervisor, and university.
In this post we’ll cover how to approach any PhD thesis corrections and I’ll share my top tips for staying organised and where to turn for support.
So read closely as we discuss the final hurdle before you can officially call yourself a doctor!
Intro to the PhD viva
Before we dive into how to approach thesis corrections I wanted to quickly do a high level recap of the PhD viva for anyone who may be unfamiliar. You’ll find a lot more detail in my introductory guide to the PhD viva article.
The PhD viva is an exam which takes place at the end of your PhD, during which you’ll defend your PhD thesis to a panel of examiners. They will have read your thesis in advance and will ask in-depth questions about your work.
As I detail in the post linked to above, there are several possible outcomes to the PhD viva. For most universities, in the UK at least, there are:
- Pass with no corrections
- Pass with minor corrections
- Referral for resubmission (major corrections)
- Fail
The focus of this post is for those receiving outcome 2 ‘Pass with minor corrections’, which is what most people will receive. The great news if you receive this outcome is that the examiners have decided that your work is worthy of your receiving a doctorate, there are just some small changes required before this will take place.
If you receive this outcome there will therefore be a list of changes that will be sent to you, typically by the internal examiner. You then need to make these changes before being awarded your PhD. To get a clear picture of what is required, check out the list of steps to completing a PhD.
It’s worth noting that there will usually be two types of thesis corrections you’ll end up making. The first are corrections your PhD examiners want you to make and the second are changes you want to make.
Let’s cover both of these in more depth.
Minor corrections your PhD examiners want you to make
Shortly after your viva you should receive a list of corrections your examiners want for you to make before you are to be awarded your PhD. This list shouldn’t come as a surprise: it should be composed of at least some of the points that examiners raised during your viva.
The required corrections will typically be discussed at the end of your exam and it’s important that you understand what these suggestions are. So make sure to ask any clarifying questions during your viva.
Also make sure that you’re able to make the changes. It’s no good agreeing with them that it’d be a good idea to do more of a particular analytical technique* if this is completely unfeasible! You’re not putting yourself in a great position if you can’t actually make the changes, so it’s best to discuss feasibility during your viva ideally.
*Things like rerunning experiments are usually reserved for major corrections. Most often minor corrections doesn’t involve much in the way of altering the experiments already presented.
The minor corrections I was requested to make for my own PhD thesis
Here is a brief overview of the corrections I had to make to my own thesis:
Text
- Inconsistent terminology, spelling and grammar
- Adding more detail and explanations
- Linking between the chapters more
Presentation
- Rearranging content
- Moving a few bits to an appendix for a more clear story
- Adding a new figure
Note: When you receive the list of corrections this may not include everything they suggested during the viva. For me personally the viva was over 5 hours long and I had several pages of notes with suggestions, but I only received a short list of required corrections.
So there may be a difference between the mandatory required corrections to complete your PhD and suggestions mentioned to make the work better. To be clear: the former are a requirement whilst the latter are optional and will not be included in the list of corrections to be made.
Minor changes you want to make
When you read your thesis ahead of the viva you may realise that there are some small changes that you would like to make. I’ll be honest: reading my thesis in the day or two before my viva was the first time I’d properly read through the assembled thesis. Before that it had been simply individual chapters as I was piecing the document together.
Small changes you may want to correct cloud include:
- typos/ grammatical errors
- formating issues
- minor sentence rephrasing
- additional detail/ clarity
If you realise that you want to make changes which are more substantial than those listed above then be sure to discuss these with your supervisor and the internal examiner before investing effort. For example, restructuring sections, removing or modifying results or figures. You have to be mindful to not change the document to a point where it is substantially different from what you were examined on.
You can make changes such as listed above (which aren’t contentious) alongside the ones required by your examiners in preparation of submitting the finalised version of your thesis.
Documenting changes to your thesis
As soon as you receive the list from your examiners you can start making the corrections. Be sure to ask the internal examiner how they want the changes to be documented. By default I would do it as if it’s revisions for a paper where you should do three things:
- Track changes and submit a copy of this tracked changes document so that it is clear to the examiner what has changed
- Additionally submit a clean copy of the corrected thesis – i.e. all changes accepted.
- Prepare an itemised list of how the examiners’ correction requests have been addressed. It is good to also acknowledge any other small changes you have made such as correcting typos that you spotted yourself.
Examples of how to describe your thesis corrections
Here are a few examples for the itemised list mentioned above. You should aim to address each required correction separately, just like with reviews for a paper. For some examples of that process read my separate guide: Example Peer Review Comments & Addressing Reviewer Feedback.
Request: Provide more details on the experimental set up described in section 3.2
Response: Further details added on page 58
***
Request: Give clarification on the motivation for chapter 4
Response: Additional clarification provided on page 120
***
Request: Modify figure 12.1 to include a legend.
Answer: Legend added to Figure 12.1 (page 78)
How long does it take to make thesis corrections?
It depends a lot on the changes your examiners have requested!
For me it took most of one day’s effort to make the changes. Most of the corrections could simply be made in Word or Photoshop. However, of course if the examiners want further analysis, significant changes to figures, new tables etc then it could easily take a lot longer than a day.
The process after making corrections
Once you’ve made the changes, you may wish to run these past your supervisor first, before passing them to the internal examiner.
It’s important to note that once it goes to the internal examiner no further changes can typically be made. In other words: the copy you send to them is the finalised copy. Therefore you should make sure you’re fully happy with the thesis at this stage. I personally didn’t (and still don’t!) worry about having a 100% perfect copy. Instead I wanted to spend that time working on papers, which for me seemed a lot more important.
Once your supervisor has looked at it you send it off to the internal examiner. They’ll then spend some time reviewing it. Once reviewed they will email the relevant people in the university to confirm that you have successfully defended your PhD and should be awarded the degree.
You would also at this stage normally upload the final copy of your thesis which the university will store online for people to access.
The university then confirms that it’s all done and that you’ve finished your PhD. All that’s left then is to celebrate that you’re done with the PhD, await your graduation ceremony, and collect your certificate!
You’ll officially be a doctor once you’ve received the confirmation from the university that you’ve finished.
Note: If you’re reading this prior to initiating the process of submitting your PhD then I’d also suggest spending some time considering what your title should be. My choice of title was one of my few PhD regrets (read the post here). I’ve since written a guide with examples to help you to come up with a PhD title you can be happy with.
Timeline for making minor thesis corrections
You might be wondering how long you get given to make your minor corrections. Typically it’ll be about three months but do check your university guidelines.
Of course you don’t need it to drag out for that long, so if you have capacity (i.e. not already in another job!) you can make the corrections much quicker. This is what I chose to do since I was trapped at my girlfriend’s parents house in a COVID lockdown!
One motivation to consider is that universities will often process all pending PhD requests and award PhDs on a particular day of the month. For Imperial this was the first of the month. In other words: submit your PhD by the end of the preceding month if you want it to be finalised quickly. This is particularly true if you’re aiming to attend a particular graduation ceremony, since there are cut-off dates you need to be aware of.
My timeline for making minor corrections to my PhD thesis
My timelines for making the minor corrections are as follows:
- Viva took place (25th March 2020)
- List of changes received from the internal examiner within 24 hours
- Within 48 hours I made the changes and submitted them to my supervisor, who was happy with them.
- I then immediately sent them to the internal examiner who was also happy with them, and they emailed the central university examination team to confirm this.
- Final copy submitted to university (~30th March)
- Awarded PhD (1st April 2020)
Since I finished my PhD at the start of COVID, I then waited another 2 years to actually attend my graduation ceremony!
General tips for making minor corrections
- Ask at the start of the viva whether you should be making notes or if one of the examiners (likely the internal) will be. Either way you may find it useful to make some notes yourself. Personally I found this helpful for having detailed clarity on what changes should be made just in case the examiner’s list is vague. They also gave some useful advice on suggestions relating to submitting papers – so not strictly to do with enhancing my thesis and these suggestions weren’t included in my list of corrections to make.
- Before agreeing to make changes, ensure you’re in a position to do so. I couldn’t make a few of mine because I was no longer able to access my university computer so couldn’t run certain software.
- Ideally get the changes done while the comments are still fresh in your mind.
- Make sure all your changes are tracked and well documented to make it as simple as possible for your examiner.
- Reach out to your supervisor and/or internal examiner should further support be needed.
I hope that’s helped demystify how to approach thesis corrections and I wish you the best of luck with the final stages of your PhD!
Do you have any other suggestions for approaching minor PhD thesis corrections?
Let me know in the comments!
