Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Submission

Explanation

After the contents and format of your thesis or dissertation has been approved by your school or college, the last step is to submit a PDF version for online archiving and access. The PDF version is submitted to Proquest/UMI, and will appear in their Dissertations Abstracts International or Masters Abstracts International databases. It will also be saved to an online repository of theses and dissertations at TCU, with a record in the TCU Library catalog that links to the PDF file. Please note that by default, theses and dissertations in TCU's repository are freely available, or become freely available at the end of any embargo period specified in your submission to UMI.

Note: If you are submitting a "Capstone Project" for the College of Education, please use the Capstone Form rather than this page.

TCU charges a $10 processing fee for both masters theses and dissertations. This fee should be paid to the TCU Cashiers Office, and a receipt presented to the faculty member in your school or college who is responsible for final approval (in most cases the associate dean).
If you don't want your thesis or dissertation to be immediately accessible online, you can specify an "embargo" period of up to two years before it becomes available. (This is one of the options on the Proquest/UMI submission forms.) If you want to restrict access for more than two years, please state this in the "notes to administrator" field in your submission, and/or discuss this with your advisor so they can convey this information to Library staff.
Files containing supplementary content that does not work well as a PDF file, such as high-resolution maps or spreadsheets, may be submitted along with the PDF file.

Reviewed 1/25/2013 by Kerry Bouchard.

How to create your PDF file

If you do not have software on your computer that can create PDF files from other documents, you can visit the Information Commons where all the desktop computers have the full version of Adobe Acrobat that can be used to create a PDF file. Lab managers in the IC will be happy to help you with this process.

On most computers that have PDF-creation software installed, "Acrobat PDF" appears as a printer -- creating a PDF file is a matter of "printing" your document to that printer. In creating your PDF file, please use the following guidelines:

Embed all fonts. Acrobat software in the Information Commons is configured to do this automatically. If you are using another computer, go into "Preferences / Adobe PDF Settings / Edit", then open the "Fonts" folder, and put a check mark in the "Embed all fonts" box if it is not already checked. (This setting ensures that people reading your PDF file will see the same fonts you used, regardless of whether they have that font installed on their computer.)
If your document contains many images, make sure the image files use some type of file compression to restrict the file size.
- Photographs and other images that have a continuous range of colors or shades of gray are best saved in JPEG format. Most software that saves JPEG files gives you the option to control the compression setting. Using the highest quality setting will give you a much smaller file size than an uncompressed file, with no discernable loss in quality.
- Charts, graphs and other computer-generated images that have sharp bounderies between different colors and/or contain a lot of text often look better and take less files space when saved in GIF format. If your software asks you which "palette" to use when saving a GIF file, choose the "Adaptive" palette.
- It is best to use image editing software, like Photoshop, to edit and save your images before importing the images into your word processing software, since word processing software often has crude control over image settings, and can produce unnecessarily large files.
Page numbering: Many people find it difficult to follow the page numbering format required by their department when their thesis or dissertation is saved as one file. If your thesis or dissertation is saved as multiple files, it is not necessary to combine it into one file before creating your PDF file. Instead, just create a separate PDF file from each original file, then use Acrobat to combine the separate PDFs into a single PDF file. This is done using the Acrobat "Document / Insert Pages" menu option -- start with the first file, then use "Insert Page" to add each subsequent file in order, using the "After / Last page" option.
After creating the PDF, make sure no Type 3 fonts are used. "Type 3" fonts are postscript fonts that can include bitmapped data. They are not recommended for use in applications such as online theses and dissertations because they are not always legible on screen at smaller sizes. To check for Type 3 fonts, open the PDF file you just created, and go to "File / Document Properties / Fonts". Scroll down through the list of fonts and make sure that none of them are Type 3 fonts. If any of them are, then go back to you original document, and try to find another font to use instead of the Type 3 font.

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Reviewed 1/25/2013 by Kerry Bouchard.

Copyright

Unless your department requires you to file for copyright, this is optional.

If you wish to copyright your thesis or dissertation, information and forms are available from the United States Copyright Office at: http://www.copyright.gov. The U.S. Copyright Office fee is $35 to file online, or $65 to file with most paper forms. See http://www.copyright.gov/docs/fees.html for the latest information. You would pay this directly to the U.S. Copyright Office, using the forms provided at the links above, not to TCU.

Alternatively, UMI will file for copyright on your behalf (this is one of the options that come up on their website when you submit your PDF file). UMI charges a $55 fee to file for copyright. If you choose to use this option, the Proquest UMI website will prompt you to pay with a credit card before completing your submission -- do not pay the TCU Cashiers Office.

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Reviewed 1/25/2013 by Kerry Bouchard.

Bound copies

The library does not require a printed copy of your thesis or dissertation, bound or unbound. If the instructions you have from your department state that the department requires a bound copy, follow their instructions.

If you wish to obtain bound copies for yourself (or if required by your department), you can ask Proquest UMI to create bound copies when you submit your PDF file, or you can work with the vendor of your choice. You can consult this list of binderies and prices. If you ask Proquest UMI to create bound copies, the Proquest UMI website will prompt you to pay with a credit card before completing your submission -- do not pay the TCU Cashiers Office.

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Reviewed 1/25/2013 by Kerry Bouchard.

Submitting your file: Step 1 "native" file(s)

In addition to submitting your PDF file to UMI, we also ask that you submit the "native" version of your dissertation (for example, Microsoft Word version) to TCU's server. TCU will archive the native version as an extra measure of safety in case problems are ever found with the PDF version. If your thesis/dissertation contains more than one native file, please submit all files (one at a time) using this form.

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Reviewed 1/25/2013 by Kerry Bouchard.

Submitting your file: Step 2 - Proquest UMI

Go to: http://dissertations.umi.com/tcu/ to submit your PDF file.

The Proquest UMI site provides step-by-step instructions for submitting your thesis or dissertation. Notes on some choices that may not be obvious are provided below.

After you click the "Submit my dissertation/thesis" link, you will get a log on screen. Unless you are revising a thesis or dissertation you've already submitted, you will need to start by clicking the: "New User? Create an account" link to create an account on the UMI system. (Your TCU username and password will not work for this.) Later, if you need to make changes to your submission, you will be able to log on again using the username and password you create here.
There is a screen where you select "No Restrictions" or "Restrictions" for your publishing option. When you select "No Restrictions", your thesis or dissertation will be freely available from TCU, and available for purchase from UMI from institutions that subscribe to UMI Proquest’s Dissertation Database or Thesis Database. If you select "Restrictions", TCU will embargo your thesis/dissertation for the same period it is embargoed with UMI before making it freely accessible from the TCU repository. If want to restrict access for more than two years, please indicate this in the "notes to administrator" field in the UMI submission form, and/or discuss this with your advisor so they can convey that to Library staff.
On the screen where you enter the title and other information about your thesis or dissertation, you will be asked to submit your abstract. You will want to use cut-and-paste so you don't have to re-type your abstract, so have your abstract open in another window.
After you have uploaded your PDF file and any supplementary files, there is a screen where you can enter "Notes to Administrator". Library staff as well as the associate dean or faculty member who approves your thesis or dissertation will see this note, so if you have special instructions/explanations regarding your thesis or dissertation, you can use this note. (However, it is best to get approval for any special instructions before submitting your thesis or dissertation.)
There are screens that ask if you want UMI to file for copyright, and if you want to buy bound copies. As stated above, both are optional, neither is required by TCU. If you do choose either or both options, be sure you have a valid credit card available to use when the Proquest/UMI site prompts for payment.

When you complete your submission, an email will automatically be generated to library staff, who pass your thesis or dissertation on to the appropriate associate dean or faculty member. If they require revisions to your thesis or dissertation, they will generate an email that will be sent to you with an explanation of the required changes, and a link you can use to go back to the UMI site and log on with the username and password you created while submitting it. You can replace the PDF file, and change any text (such as title, abstract) that you entered in your first submission. When your thesis/dissertation is approved, you will receive another email acknowledgement.

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Reviewed 1/25/2013 by Kerry Bouchard .