The following guidelines apply to Master’s degree projects carried out at the Department of Design Sciences, and are to be used alongside the instructions on the degree project process found on the Student website LTH.

Cooperation Agreement, rights and responsibilities when carrying out your degree project at a host company

A number of practical issues arise when you carry out your degree project at a company or organisation regarding, for example, confidentiality, contacts, compensation, accommodations, travel, etc. These types of issues are discussed between the student(s) with his or her host company contact and need to be approved by all parties (student(s), supervisor(s), examiner, host company) before the project begins. In some cases, a written agreement may be required. Either the host company has its own, or you can use the Cooperation Agreement – Degree Project form which you can get from the course administrator or download from the LTH student website. If you are unsure about these issues – contact your supervisor or examiner. The supervisor(s), company and student(s) also need to agree on what is acceptable to be written in the report and the level of detail in order for the examination of the project work to be carried out. The host company or organisation must also be informed that the degree thesis is a public document and will be published in the Lund University Publication database (LUP). 

Getting started and study locations

When your degree project registration has been approved by your programme planner, you will receive an email from the course administrator with a report template, among other information. Use this template for the ongoing documentation of your project work. 

As a degree project student at the Department of Design Sciences, you are welcome to use one of the desks in the offices that are available in the south corridors on levels 4 and 5. You will have access to the rooms as soon as you have completed the registration. You can also use the kitchens on levels 4 and 5, but please avoid the lunch hour rush between 11:30 and 12:30. Please do not use the general staff areas as a workplace (kitchen tables or sofas).

Communication with your supervisor(s)

Agree with your supervisor(s) on how often and when you should meet during the project work process. As a rule, you are responsible for initiating supervision meetings. Contact your supervisor regarding the date and time and the points to discuss so that he/she has time to prepare. The supervisors have teaching responsibilities and other commitments and may have difficulty meeting students who have not booked a time in advance. 

To facilitate communication with your supervisor, the file name of the current version of the report should be clear and concise, such as date_lastname1_lastname2. This reduces confusion and mixing up of documents. Reach an agreement with your supervisor if Word or PDF or another format is best suited for your communication.

Write a report

Writing a report is an important part of the thesis. To make it easier, the department has created two templates that you can use. A template with suggestions on how to structure the report and a word template that helps with the formatting of the report. You will receive the templates in the start email sent by the course administrator when your thesis application has been approved.

Note that the supervisor is not responsible for proofreading (whether it is in Swedish or English). If you need help with proofreading, you can, for example, contact The Academic Support Centre at Lund University.

Critical review of a fellow student’s project

One of the degree project criteria to receive a passing grade is to carry out an approved critical review of a fellow student’s project. There is an advantage in doing so early on, but this may be difficult to implement in practice. As a rule, there will be a number of project presentations at the end of each term at which degree students can critically review one another. We do not recommend that you review a co-student’s project where the author has been or will be critically reviewing your own degree project.

Note that it is also practical to keep an eye out for a person who can be your critical reviewer early on! Take a look at the LTH Canvas page for degree projects. If there are no special reasons, each presentation should have at least one critical reviewer who examines the work in addition to the examiner.

To do before your presentation seminar

As you approach the end of your degree project, you need todo the following:

1. When you have determined that your report is complete, send it by email to your supervisor(s). The supervisor(s) will review the report and give you the go ahead that it is ready for presentation. If not, you will need to revise the report based on the supervisor’s comments. 
2. Write a popular scientific summary. As with the rest of the report, this should be reviewed by your supervisor(s) and revised before the presentation if necessary. 
3. If you have not already done so, find a critical reviewer(s)! It is up to you to find one or more suitable critical reviewers, for example, by determining who else is doing their degree project work on the same subject or a related one.
4. Coordinate the date and time for the presentation with your supervisor(s), examiner and critical reviewer(s). When all are in agreement, notify the course administrator of the date and time. Summit the title, a short summary and the names of everyone involved (other students working with you on the degree project, critical reviewer(s), supervisor(s) and examiner) to the course administrator as well. The course administrator books a room and/or a digital presentation and sends out the invitation. Do this no later than one week before the presentation date.  
5. You are welcome to invite people to attend the presentation. We provide cider and chocolate afterwards.
6. No later than one week before the agreed time for the presentation, the critical reviewer(s), supervisor(s) and examiner shall be sent the final version of the report.
7. The prepared presentation material is usually in the form of a PowerPoint presentation (PPT file).

Presentation seminar

We usually calculate about an hour for the presentation seminar. This is ordinarily distributed as follows:

• 2-3 minute introduction and presentation of the participants: main supervisor.
• 20 minute presentation: degree student(s). 
  Start the presentation at a level that everyone in the audience can understand what it is about and what problem you have tried to solve. Rehearse in advance so that you keep within the time frame.
• 15-25 minute for questions from the critical reviewer(s), the audience and the examiner.

The oral presentation is directly certified by the examiner, while the report needs to be approved before it can be certified. It is more the rule than the exception that the report will need final adjustments after the presentation. Ask the examiner to approve the activity in your degree project form. 

Examination

Important! Make sure your goal document is uploaded to your degree project form and that is has been approved by yoursupervisor and examinor. When this is done the examination section will be opened and the examinor can approve all the different parts of your degree project when they are completed.

Complete your project report

Complete the degree project report by entering the relevant changes that emerged from the critical reviewer(s) and the examiner. Then send in the updated version to your supervisor(s) and the examiner for a final assessment. This updated version is expected to be of high quality in terms of structure, language and style as well as in following the report template’s guidelines. It should be clear what changes you have made; describe them briefly in the email when you submit the report.

Approval

When the report and summary have been approved by the examiner, he/she certifies the remaining sections of the degree project form.

It is now time to upload the report and abstract in LUP. Then inform the administrator who approves LUP in the degree project form and add your result to Ladok.

Make sure the examinor for the project you critically reviewed has approved this section in your degree project form.    

Printing

If you want to have a printed copy of your report, you are responsible for the cost. Printing can, for example, be done at E-huset’s Printing Office or at Media Tryck. If a host company has been involved, they may also want to have a number of reports. Agree with them on how you will distribute the cost.