Prospective PhD Students

PostGraduate Research

Information for Year 4 PhD Students

The most important thing for you to do during the fourth year is to finish writing your thesis.

Your PhD is supported by Liverpool Doctoral College which provides a focus and oversees all doctoral training and development in the University. The Liverpool Doctoral College provides a range of personal and professional development opportunities to support your PhD. Please see the Liverpool Doctoral College Intranet webpages.

IPAP Members and Supervisors

Here is a list of students, their supervisors and IPAP members.

Training and Progress Monitoring Requirements

The expected training and progress monitoring for the year includes the following.
  • Completing your Annual Progression Requirements. The PGR Team state the following.

    "All postgraduate research students are required to continue using the Toolbox to record formal meetings until their research degree is awarded. However they do not need to use/submit the Portfolio of Activity after their Thesis has been submitted. This is to ensure the PGRs have formal and regular contact with supervisors in those cases in which corrections/re-submission is required."

  • Additionally, attending Departmental Seminars and your research group seminars is expected/strongly encouraged. Seminar attendance helps develop transferable skills such as oral communication skills, presentation skills, persuading skills, analytical/logical thinking skills, critical thinking skills, problem solving skills, decision making skills, research skills.

  • If you haven't already attended at the School Seminar Finishing Your PhD: Thesis, Viva, Training in year three, this is strongly encouraged. This is aimed at year three and four students but year two are also welcome. It will be presented annually. This reminds students of the expected training in years three and four; describes the University requirements and standards for a PhD and how they are examined; gives advice on writing a PhD thesis and how to prepare for a viva; and outlines the forms to be completed.

  • When you have completed your primary research, normally at the end of 3 years full time study, you can transfer to submission pending status. The form is available on the PGR Forms and Procedures web page. Please check that this will not affect your funding before you do this.

  • You must submit an Intent to Submit form at least two months before submission of your thesis. The form is available on the PGR Forms and Procedures web page.

  • You need to submit two copies of your thesis to the Student Reception in the Foundation Building. These should be soft bound. The Student office can help you with this. This should be accompanied by a Thesis Submission Form. The form is available on the PGR Forms and Procedures web page. You should also send an electronic copy of your thesis by email to the PGR Team (pgrs@liverpool.ac.uk).

  • In April/May you should attend the Department of Computer Science Postgraduate Workshop. This helps develop transferable skills such as communication skills, in particular listening and presentation skills, interpersonal skills, and critical thinking skills.
  • In June, you will be asked to complete an Annual Progress Report (APR) via Spider/Tulip. Year four students should do this if they may need to register again in September, for example to do corrections. As a rule of thumb if you haven't yet had your viva when these are released you should complete it. Completed training picked up by the system is listed in a box on the report. Following this is a box entitled "any other training courses that are not mentioned above". If any of the expected training is missing please explain why and say when you will complete it. When you have completed this, it will be passed electronically to your supervisor, the DDPR, the PGR Team and (sometimes) the Faculty.

  • Having submitted your thesis your internal examiner will arrange a viva. As part of preparing for your viva you may want to discuss possible questions with your supervisor or take part in a mock viva. There are a number of possible outcomes of the viva.

  • Once you have completed any corrections required by your examiners and a final version of your thesis has been approved you need to submit an electronic version into Liverpool Elements. Details about how to do this can be found here.

    • Thesis Writing and Submission