Honors Thesis FAQs

The Office of Undergraduate Research manages the Honors Thesis Program. You may write to us at ntcthesis@tulane.edu.

The Honors Thesis is a two-semester independent academic project under the direction of faculty. It allows students to explore a question, test a hypothesis, or create a work of art, ultimately contributing original scholarship to the field in which the thesis is written. It provides an unparalleled opportunity for students to address questions that contribute to our local, national, and global communities from a range of disciplinary perspectives. 

The thesis is a substantive accomplishment that speaks eloquently to a student’s academic and scholarly credentials as compared with GPA or Latin honors alone. Apart from the merits of the intellectual experience, the thesis is also a significant credential— a clear way of demonstrating to graduate schools, professional schools, and future employers that you are capable of independent research and critical thought.

The College requires that at least two readers sit on an Honors Thesis Author's Thesis Committee. A Third Reader may be required by some Thesis Committees, Schools, or Departments.

No. The Honors Thesis is required in order to earn departmental honors in the major in which the thesis is written. 

Topics for Honors Theses generally develop out of ongoing relationships with faculty mentors. Students normally begin a preliminary exploration of the thesis topic in discussion with one or more potential faculty advisors during the spring of the junior year. For some STEM fields, however, students must begin working in a lab well before this to be prepared to conduct thesis research in their senior year. Students are encouraged to take the Honors Thesis Boot Camp course during the spring of their junior year to prepare for the thesis and draft their prospectus.

Unlike other Tulane courses, students may not register themselves for the Honors Thesis through Gibson. Students register with their department office each semester (so a student writing a thesis in English would register through the English department). For the thesis to be approved, students must also submit a prospectus to Newcomb-Tulane College and adhere to scheduled deadlines throughout the academic year.

The Honors Thesis is a two-semester project. 4990 is the fall course number (3 credit hours) and 5000 (3-4 credit hours, depending on major department) is the course number for spring. A student writing for Political Science, for instance, should be registered for POLS 4990 during the fall semester, and POLS 5000 for the spring. (Biomedical Engineering and 5-year Architecture students will register for the standard capstone/thesis course sequence in their program and complete the additional Honors Thesis requirements outlined by Newcomb-Tulane College, in addition to any additional requirements imposed by their program.)Students in the fine arts (e.g. studio art, dance, music, theatre) have the option of completing a Senior Honors Project in the Fine Arts instead of a traditional written thesis (see below for more details). For the Senior Honors Project in the Fine Arts, 4991 is the fall course number (3 credits) and 5001 is the spring course number (3 credits).  

Students may write an Honors Thesis in two majors. They will have a first reader from one major and a second reader from the other.  Each reader is, in effect, a co-director for the major they represent. Students who are writing theses in two major departments register for 4990 in one department and 5000 in the other. From the perspective of Newcomb-Tulane College, it does not matter in which order the credits are registered, but it’s recommended that students check with their major advisors. Please note that students will be working with both co-directors throughout the year, even though they are registered through one department for the fall and the other in the spring.

The first reader will be the instructor of record for the thesis, and responsible for assigning a grade (in consultation with the other readers). The first reader serves as the director of the thesis committee. If the thesis is being written for two majors, the reader from the department that the thesis credits are registered for in the spring semester will assign the final grade for the thesis.

Thesis course credits are unlike other course credits and do not adhere to the regular add/drop deadline. These credits can be scheduled more flexibly, not unlike independent study credits.

Yes. Students should consult with Undergraduate Research & Fellowships about selecting this option.

Yes. Students should consult with Undergraduate Research & Fellowships about selecting this option.

Students do not need to be designated as Honors students to write a thesis. To be eligible to write an Honors Thesis, students are generally expected to have an overall GPA of 3.4, and a GPA of 3.5 in the major for which the student is writing for honors. Departments may make exceptions to the GPA threshold on a case-by-case basis where warranted. 

This varies by discipline, but students are strongly encouraged to work on getting into a lab as early as possible. Generally, if a student in the lab sciences is not yet connected with a lab by the junior year, it may be too late to pursue a thesis. 

No. This course has been discontinued. Once you are registered for the Honors Thesis, expect several Cohort Sessions to occur during your senior year.

The first reader must be a regular NTC faculty member within the department(s) in which honors will be granted (e.g., tenured, tenure-track, and professors of practice). An exception will be made for students completing a project in an NTC-approved major in the School of Professional Advancement, such that SoPA faculty may serve as a first reader. In addition to regular faculty, Visiting Assistant/Associate Professors, administrative faculty, and non-NTC Tulane faculty (e.g. SoPA, Law, Medicine, & Social Work) will be allowed by policy to serve as second or third readers. Non-Tulane faculty and other professionals within the field will be allowed by policy to serve as third readers; such faculty are to be approved for inclusion on the committee by the first reader. Adjunct professors will be allowed by exception to serve as second or third readers with the approval of the relevant department chair. Post-docs will be allowed by exception to serve as second or third readers with department chair approval, provided their principal investigator is not also serving on the same thesis committee.

If the thesis committee is only compromised of two readers, the second reader should come from outside the student's major department.

In this case, the PI, should not serve as the instructor of record (first reader). For administrative purposes, they should be the second (or third) reader, and a faculty member representing the student’s major department should serve as the first reader. The PI can be listed as a co-director on the final thesis submission. 

The thesis is not graded until the student has passed the oral defense and submitted the final thesis. The grade for the fall semester will show as “IP” (In Progress) until the final grade is submitted.

The length of the thesis will depend on the nature of the project and the expectations of the field in which the thesis is written. Students in the more discursive fields (History, for instance) should usually aim for around 60-75 pages. Theses in subjects where research is usually expressed in large part through formulas and figures (Math, for instance) tend to be shorter.

A or A-

The Honors Thesis credits may be dropped at any time WITHOUT RECORD. The student should work with their NTC College Advisor and the Registrar’s Office to drop the credits officially from the transcript. With permission of the thesis director, independent study credits may then be added to the transcript for one or both semesters through the major department. This process is sometimes referred to as converting thesis credits to independent study but is in fact two separate steps—one through College Advising and the other through the department.

Yes, the 4990-5000 course sequence fulfills the second-tier writing requirement. 

The 4991-5001 course sequence for the Senior Honors Project in the Fine Arts does NOT fulfill the second-tier writing requirement.

Yes, if the thesis constitutes an educational experience based upon a collaborative partnership between the university and the community. Students must submit a petition to the Center for Public Service.

The schedule, requirements, and expectations for thesis a in the fine arts are essentially the same as for those in the laboratory sciences, humanities, and social sciences. As in other majors, students who propose theses in the fine arts should have experience in upper-level courses or other relevant instruction in their chosen fields and prior experience in the genre or medium of the proposed thesis.

Where the honors thesis prospectus asks students to frame their projects as questions or problems in terms of the state of relevant scholarship, students proposing theses in the fine arts should identify and discuss the main artistic problem or challenge in terms of how other authors or artists have confronted the same or similar problems.

The main body of the thesis should reflect the relevant form or medium of the field for which the student is completing the project: a collection of short stories, a portfolio of images, a musical score, etc. But whatever the main form or medium of the project, all theses in the fine arts must include a substantial analytical or critical discussion of the project as a problem or challenge in the student’s chosen field. (For example, a student writing a novella with a coming-of-age theme might introduce his or her work with a chapter analyzing several examples of that genre, as a way of introducing the student’s own distinctive approach to the creative challenges of the genre.)

The final thesis should typically include at least 20 pages of prose, in addition to the main focus of the thesis project. In most cases, it should be possible for students to coordinate thesis defenses with performance dates, exhibitions, or other relevant events.  In cases where it seems to the readers best to hold such an event after the deadline for the thesis defense, please contact the Office of Academic Enrichment—or ask the student to contact the Office of Academic Enrichment—so that we know what is being planned.  Unless the adjustment to the schedule will cause some other problem, we will normally give the student an extension on the thesis defense.

In most cases, this is not possible. All Honors Theses are submitted to Tulane University Libraries upon successful completion. Once a thesis is archived in the repository, there are strict guidelines related to removing it. Please consult the Library's deaccession policy for more information.