Doctoral Studies

Before requesting admission as a doctoral student at the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences of the University of Lucerne, we strongly advise you to carefully study the steps involved in the process towards admission:

Step 1) Check the basic prerequisites for a doctorate
To be considered for admission to doctoral studies at our faculty, you must meet the requirements for admission listed in the faculty's PhD regulations and the accompanying guidelines plus you need to have received a confirmation by a faculty member who is a qualified professor that he or she will serve as your first supervisor.

Please consider that finding a first supervisor often is a long process, as professors are completely free regarding who they supervise and select candidates very carefully and according to their personal interest and their capacity to supervise an additional doctoral student. Thus before contacting a professor, check whether he or she actually works in your field of interest and whether you bring the needed competences for a doctorate in the chosen field. In the first e-mail contacting a potential first supervisor, describe why supervising your doctoral research project might be good fit for him or her and attach a short CV and project description.

Regarding language skills: For the doctoral research project, it is up to the first supervisor to introduce required language skills. The lingua franca of the Graduate School is English. German skills are desired by the University of Lucerne, but not required.

Step 2) Admission request administered by the Admissions Office
The University's main admissions office is responsible for assessing your admission request regarding whether it meets formal requirements and whether your past academic training is sufficient for admission to a doctorate at our faculty. Admission requests need to be handed in via UniPortal. Please note that for requesting admission to doctoral studies at the University of Lucerne, the following deadlines apply:

31st August for the coming Fall Term
31st January for the coming Spring Term

After the passing of these deadlines, the UniPortal is closed to admission requests for the term in question.

New external doctoral students must apply online. Doctoral students who have studied at the University of Lucerne before should use the doctorate re-registration form.

Before starting your admission request via the UniPortal, carefully study everything needed (including which documents you need to upload in PDF or JPG format) for finalizing your admission request by following this link.

Step 3) Admission request decided by the Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences
Only after the admissions office decides that your admission request meets formal requirements for admission to as a doctoral student, your admission request will be forwarded to the Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences (GSL). The GSL Board will then decide on whether you will be admitted as a doctoral student from a perspective of "content" and whether some additional requirements need to be fulfilled prior to admission or during your doctoral studies. The decision regarding a definite admission by the GSL will be communicated to you via e-mail in the first or second week of the term.
The GSL will also inform the admissions office about the decision taken and the admissions office will contact you to initiate step 4)

Step 4) Finalizing your enrollment as a doctoral student
Once the GSL informs the admissions office that you can be admitted to the doctoral studies, the admissions office will contact you to finalize your admission, i.e. complete your enrollment as a doctoral student.

Downloads*

Research Assistants and Scientific Staff (e.g. SNSF Researchers): Supervision Agreement
Independent Doctoral Students: Supervision Agreement

Important note for research assistants (faculty positions): Pleaseremember to fill in a Career Assessment for Emloyment and Training Agreement (ETA) (for the Human Resources Department).

* If the Supervision Agreement form does not open as a fillable form, click: file -> open in immersive Browser.

Prelimenary Remarks
Please note that for the mandatory study achievement "Attendance of course teaching academic skills in methodological or theoretical aspects", a certificate of attendance needs to be submitted to the GSL office along with the next progress report (for further information and forms, see below).

Compulsory registration applies throughout the duration of doctoral studies at the University of Lucerne.
Doctoral studies are subject to Graduate School specifications and are governed by the doctoral regulations and the guidelines to the doctoral regulations.

The curricula shown correspond to the study achievements required for doctoral students beginning from the autumn semester of 2012. Doctoral students registering before the autumn semester of 2012 should consult the relevant guidelines.

Grant holders
The doctoral process is to be designed in such a way that studies can be completed within three years. The supervisor and, where relevant, the GSL will help students to keep to this timetable as far as possible. If there are changes to the timetable, they are communicated to the GSL as part of the annual report.

Research Assistants and Scientific Staff (e.g. SNSF Researchers)
The doctoral process is to be designed in such a way that studies can be completed within four years. The supervisor and, where relevant, the GSL will help students to keep to this timetable as far as possible. If there are changes to the timetable, they are communicated as part of the annual progress report.

Independent Doctoral Students:
The doctoral process is to be designed in such a way that studies can be completed within a reasonable period of time. The supervisor and, where relevant, the GSL will help students to keep to this timetable as far as possible. If there are changes to the timetable, they are communicated as part of the annual progress report.

For those carrying out doctoral studies without university employment or a GSL grant, the overall duration of the doctoral study is not limited. However, admission to the GSL is limited to a period of five years. After this period has elapsed, the Board of the GSL will assess the progress of the dissertation and reach a decision on the duration of a further period of admission.

Notes on individual study achievements:

Attendance of course teaching academic skills in methodological or theoretical aspects:
- To fulfill these course requirements, formats such as summer schools, winter schools, workshops, block weeks, Master Classes, Master seminars, (…) can be credited - provided that the work effort for their attendance is equivalent to the effort of attending a Master seminar.
- All courses offered by the GSL, the attendance of which is considered as fulfillment of the mandatory achievements, are labeled as such. Comparable courses organized externally can also be attended in agreement with the supervisor.
- Generic skills courses can be counted as fulfillment of mandatory study achievements regarding the attendance of a “course teaching academic skills in methodological or theoretical aspects” if the following is adhered to: At least 5 days of generic skills courses must be attended and the first supervisor has to approve that the sum of courses is recognized as equivalent to having attended one mandatory course. Attendance must be proven by handing in external course attendance certificates or handing in a "Certificate of Achievement" provided by the GSL (see below).
  In the progress report generic skills courses should be listed under “Generic Skills Courses” but also pointed to in the category “Mandatory Courses”. If not already 5 days of courses have been attended, they should still be listed with the commentary that attendance at further courses is planned in order to fulfill the requirement of 5 course days attended.
- The following course formats are not considered as courses teaching academic skills in methodological or theoretical aspects: Bachelor seminars, language courses, conference attendances (see below).
Attendance of and presentation given at an international conference: students may request financial support from the GSL for attending conferences.

All course and conference attendance and any presentations given at colloquia should be certified by the course organiser. This can be done using either certificates of attendance issued by the event organiser or GSL certificates of credit (see download). All certificates of attendance can be submitted to the GSL either together with the annual progress reports, where they will be archived, or alternatively may be submitted at the end of the period of doctoral study.

Certificate of Achievement for Doctoral Studies GSL (Word)

Certificate of Achievement for Doctoral Studies GSL (PDF)

Informal examination of study achievements

Before completion of the thesis and before the application is submitted to initiate the doctoral examination procedure, the GSL office is to be contacted for an informal examination of study achievements that were completed as part of the structured doctoral studies programme at the Graduate School of Humanities and Social Sciences. It is best if the GSL office gets contacted as soon as the date of completion becomes foreseeable in order to allow for time to complete requirements that still need to be completed.

All study achievements must be certified in writing to meet the requirements set out in § 3 to 5 of the Guidelines for the Doctoral Regulations. If doctoral students wish achievements completed in addition to the GSL study credits to appear on the GSL certificate, they must submit written documentation to the office before the viva examination. It is the doctoral student’s decision which additional achievements to list on the certificate.

Application to initiate the doctoral examination procedure

The doctoral examination procedure is initiated by a resolution of the Board at the request of the candidate.

The application must be addressed to the Chairman or Chairwoman of the Board and submitted to the GSL office.

The following documents must accompany the application:

1. Three copies of the dissertation (for cumulative theses, please note the special requirements stated in the Guidelines for the Doctoral Regulations). Please carefully read our information sheet about review and deposit copies.

2. A summary of the dissertation in triplicate outlining the objective, content and findings of the dissertation. This shall not be identical to any section of the Dissertation
3. A declaration by the candidate stating that the dissertation is entirely his/her own work, that only the specified resources were used in writing the dissertation and that any direct quotes or content drawn from another source is referenced accordingly.
4. A declaration as to whether the dissertation has previously been submitted to any faculty, either in its present form or another version
5. Proof of participation in the doctoral study programme at the Faculty in accordance with §3- 5 of the Guidelines for the Doctoral Regulations)
6. Proof of enrolment for the duration of the doctoral study programme (available from the Student Administration Office)

Assessment and Viva Examination

Following a Board resolution, the Examinations Committee asks two qualified members of the Faculty to provide a first and second assessment. The second dissertation assessor (= reviewer) may also be a qualified member of another faculty or university Usually, the first and second dissertation supervisors are also the first and second assessors of the thesis. The GSL arranges for the thesis to be sent to the reviewers. After this is done, the completion of the graduation process is no longer organized by the GSL Office.

The reviewers must submit their thesis reviews to the examination board within four months of being commissioned. Once all reviews have been submitted, they are displayed together with the thesis in the Dean of the Faculty’s office for a period of four weeks for inspection by full-time graduate research and teaching staff and associates of the faculty.

The date of the viva examination is set by the Dean’s Office in consultation with the doctoral student and the reviewers. The viva examination generally takes place within three months of the thesis being accepted. If desired by the candidate, the viva examination will be open to all doctoral students and an external audience. The viva examination consists of a presentation by the doctoral student lasting approximately twenty minutes and a discussion lasting approximately forty minutes. Following acceptance of the thesis, the candidate will be issued a bill for the examination fees by Financial Services.

Title

After successful completion of the viva examination, the candidate is entitled to hold the title of doctor designate (Dr. des.) until graduation. Once the deposit copies are submitted (see publication regulations), the candidate becomes a Doctor of Philosophy (Ph. D.). A reference is issued confirming the candidate's doctoral study work. It shall be signed by the dean. In addition, a certificate is issued by the GSL covering participation in the structured doctoral study programme.

Publication regulations

Information on the formatting of the deposit copies can be found in the information sheet about review and deposit copies.

Doctoral Studies

Mobility

Seed funding

Workshops and retreats

Service

Doctoral Studies

Admission to Doctoral Studies/ Enrollment

Study achievements

Supervision

Progress Reports

Joint Doctoral Degree

Leave of Absence

Completion PhD

Financial Support

Mobility

Seed funding

Workshops and retreats

Help/Support Miscellaneous

Counseling Literature Doctorate

Doctoral regulations, guidance instructions, information sheets