Document Preparation

Student Responsibility

PhD and master’s students are responsible for meeting all requirements for preparing theses and dissertations. They are expected to confer with their advisors about disciplinary and program expectations and to follow Graduate School procedure requirements.

Graduate School Role

The Graduate School certifies that theses and dissertations have been prepared as required. Graduate School staff members are available to provide information and to review documents at any stage of the planning or writing process. The Graduate School will not accept documents if required items are missing. The Graduate School cannot provide hands on training or editing of a document to meet formatting and digital accessibility standards. The Graduate School will not extend deadlines because of miscommunication between the student and the advisor.

Required Format Features

Ohio State dissertations and theses must contain the following format features, which must be identified with a major heading that is centered below at least a one-inch top margin. The Graduate School highly recommends you use one of the templates in the following section as many of these features are already setup to help simplify the process. Visit our format review page for more information on format review and submission.

Specific Required Format Features

Title page
Copyright
Abstract
Vita
Table of Contents
List of Figures
Bibliography
List of Tables (if applicable)
List of Illustrations (if applicable)
Appendices (if applicable)

Digital Accessibility Features (Features implemented beginning Spring 2023)

*(see links below for information about applying these features)

As of August 1st 2024, if students need access to Adobe Acrobat to run a digital accessibility checker on their dissertation or thesis, they can visit the visit the Digital Union (Macs only), Research Commons Computer Lab, and the public library sites at the Thompson Main Library and 18^th Avenue Library.

Graduate School Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Accessibility Plan

PDF file includes full text
PDF accessibility permission flag is checked
Text language of the PDF is specified
PDF includes a title
Images, figures, and tables have descriptive captions and/or alt tags explaining content

Electronic Dissertation and Thesis Adobe Acrobat Download and Accessibility Support Video

OSU Login is required for access.