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אוניברסיטת
תל אביב /
הפקולטה
למדעי הרוח בית
הספר למדעי
התרבות ע"ש
שירלי ולזלי
פורטר The Shirley and |
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FAQ about Doctoral Studies |
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This collection of FAQ is meant to serve as
explanations for frequently asked questions. In any case of doubt, only the Tel Aviv University
Regulations and the School’s Guidelines
are legally binding. |
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2.
Can one register as a
doctoral student without getting the consent of a supervisor? 3.
What are ‘doctoral studies’
at Tel Aviv University? 5.
How do I select a doctoral
advisor? 6.
How do I approach a faculty
member and ask him/her to be my advisor? 7.
Who is authorized to be a
doctoral advisor? 8.
Is a senior faculty member
obliged to advise anyone who registers as a doctoral student? 10. I cannot afford my studies. Is financial aid available
for my studies towards a PhD degree? 11. A senior faculty member has agreed to be my advisor.
What should I do? |
12. How do I register for the PhD degree? 13. How long does a doctorate take? 14. How is the PhD structured? What do "preliminary
stages" and "advanced stages" mean? 15. How do you write a proposal? 17. Who reviews the proposal and what is the procedure for
its approval? 18. What happens if the proposal is rejected? 19. How long is the doctoral thesis? 20. Who evaluates the doctoral thesis and what is the
approval process? |
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1. |
Looking
for Information. I would like some information about applying to
the |
Graduates
with a master's degree, a minimum cumulative grade of 80, and a master's
thesis grade of at least 85 may apply for studies leading to the PhD. Please
contact the registrar at It is assumed that you can read Hebrew, as most documents, forms and
regulations are only available in Hebrew. Most courses are also carried out
only in Hebrew. In the
Israeli PhD system there are no structured doctoral studies. One writes a
dissertation under the supervision of a person, not in the framework of a
department. What you therefore must do is look for a potential supervisor,
negotiate with that person, and once you get that person’s consent, then you
can register at the school where your supervisor belongs to. Many
faculty members have Websites that can be studied, so you can investigate
their profiles to find out who may be approached. |
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2. |
Can one register
as a doctoral student without getting the consent of a supervisor?
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There is a possibility
to register as ‘a candidate of a candidate for doctoral studies,’ but this
does not mean you will get eventually the consent of a supervisor. You may
register in order to try and participate in some courses, use the library and
the Internet databases, with the aim to be able to get in touch with
potential supervisors. It is not recommended
to overseas students to take this option, since there is no guarantee that
this would lead them to finding a supervisor. |
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3. |
What are
‘doctoral studies’ at
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In the Israeli PhD
system, like the European and unlike the American, one writes a dissertation under
the supervision of a person, not in the framework of a regular course of
studies at some department. One must take 2-4 courses (8 hours) to be taken
in subjects relevant to the PhD research, but the main core of studies is
carrying out the research on the basis of which the PhD dissertation is
written. |
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4. |
What do
I need to do? I fulfill all the requirements for registering as
a PhD student, and am interested in writing a PhD dissertation at the |
You must look for a
supervisor or supervisors and get their consent. If they are faculty at the |
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5. |
How do I select a doctoral advisor?
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It is customary to
choose your doctoral advisor according to their work and field of expertise.
We recommend scanning the faculty lists in the various relevant departments
for persons working on topics compatible with your interests, reading their
publications, sitting in on their classes and reviewing work that they have
supervised. It's also possible to
search for potential advisors via the internet; checking for their publications,
courses and works that they have supervised in order to get a sense of their
field of expertise and interests. However, there are still some researchers
whose works are not readily available online and may be found only by
browsing the library for books and journals. |
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6. |
How do I
approach a faculty member and ask him/her to be my advisor?
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We recommend sending a
potential doctoral advisor a brief letter with your request, as well as a
page-long summary of your proposal idea and a short bibliography. A few
autobiographical details (your personal and academic background) may also
help your potential advisor get a sense of the academic ground that he or she
will need to provide, in order for you to work on the topic of his or her
expertise. Some doctoral
candidates choose to approach faculty members according to their membership
in a certain department and without having any prior knowledge of their work.
This course of action is extremely unadvised; it is unlikely to have a good
rapport with an advisor you don't know enough about. |
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7. |
Who is
authorized to be a doctoral advisor?
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Any tenured university
faculty member who holds the position of senior lecturer or higher can serve
as a PhD advisor. |
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8. |
Is a
senior faculty member obliged to advise anyone who registers as a doctoral
student?
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No, there is no
obligation whatsoever on the part of the senior lecturer to advise any
candidate. His or her agreement to become an advisor is strictly voluntary. |
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9. |
I
have a general idea and a sense of the field I am interested in, but I don't
have a specific topic in mind.
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"A general idea
and a sense of the field" is a good place to start. You should try to find
a potential advisor whose area of expertise fits this general notion. If they
see your idea to be promising, you can embark on an intellectual negotiation
with him or her in order to advance and develop it into a concrete avenue of
research. The preliminary stages
of exploring a potential topic for research, as well as gradually arriving at
its conceptual formulation are characteristic of most research projects. In a
PhD research project, the advisor's first task is to discuss the project's
formulation with the candidate. In order for this to take place; the advisor
must express interest in the idea and its related field(s). |
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10. |
I cannot
afford my studies. Is financial aid available for my
studies towards a PhD degree?
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11. |
A senior
faculty member has agreed to be my advisor. What should I do?
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You are now eligible to
register for a PhD. Register with the secretary of the School for Cultural Studies.
See answer to question # 13. This procedure is also necessary if you have
already applied as a "candidate to become a doctoral candidate", in
which case you need to change your status to a "preliminary stage
doctoral candidate", in the same manner. |
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12. |
How do I
register for the PhD degree?
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1.
Fill
out the application form
available on the School for Cultural Studies website and have your advisor/s
sign it. The advisor's signature means that he or he has agreed to advise
your doctoral thesis. Attention: Any student signing the form authorizes that he/she has read and
understood PhD regulations as they appear in the University Manual and
in the Guidelines for the School of Cultural
Studies. This signature is
legally binding. 2.
Submit
your completed form to the 3.
Submit
a passport photo a statement of completion of MA studies to the
office of the |
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13. |
How long
does a doctorate take?
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The Tel Aviv University
Guidelines state that PhD studies shall not exceed 5 (five) years from the
date of registration for the preliminary stage doctoral candidacy to their
completion. If you are registered as a "candidate for candidacy",
this stage is not taken into account as part of the doctoral timeframe. |
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14. |
How
is the PhD structured? What do "preliminary stages" and
"advanced stages" mean?
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PhD studies consist of
the following: [1] The preparation
period. In this stage, called the preliminary stage, the student already
has an advisor. With the advisor's guidance, the student develops his or her research
program and submits it to The School of Cultural Research's Committee for
Doctoral Candidates no longer than one year from the date of registration.
Proposal submission is done via the advisor and is dependant their approval.
The proposal is then sent to two outside readers for evaluation. Upon their
approval, the student goes on to the advanced stage. [2] The research
stage. This is called the advanced
stage, and the student arrives at it only following to the approval of his or
her proposal. The doctoral thesis must be submitted no longer than four years
after starting the research stage and it is then evaluated by external
readers. |
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15. |
How do
you write a proposal?
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For general guidelines
for writing a research proposal, click here. Of course, no two
proposals are alike, and while you are in the preliminary stage, it is
important to submit several drafts of your proposal to your advisor for his
or her comments and suggestions. |
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16. |
Does the
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A research project's
methodologies, attributes and goals are all at the discretion of the student
with the guidance of his or her advisor and according to the accepted
procedures in the relevant field of study. The School for Cultural Research
and the Committee for Doctoral Candidates do not have any methodological
guidelines or recommendations for research projects. The Committee deals with
all matters pertaining to a proposal's review, approval and in the final
stage, its evaluation. The project is evaluated by well-established scholars
in the relevant field of study. While this evaluation surely takes into
account the methodological aspects of the study, these are selected in accordance
with the project's goals, with the established procedures of the field, and
with the advisor's guidance. Therefore, even the question of whether a
certain research project should be empirical by nature, and what the
parameters of study it should entail, is one to be answered by the doctoral
candidate in accordance with the abovementioned criteria and her advisor's
guidance. Thus there is no need to consult with the Head of the School for
Cultural Research or with the Head of the Committee for Doctoral Candidates
regarding the specific methodology of your work. |
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17. |
Who
reviews the proposal and what is the procedure for its approval?
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After the advisor has
approved your proposal (and signed the research proposal form), it is submitted
to the School for Cultural Research's Committee for Doctoral Students. The
Committee then gives the proposal to two expert scholars in In the event that the
expert reader offers corrections, the proposal will be returned to the
candidate for revision. The rewritten proposal is then submitted for the
reader's approval. It is then authorized by the School's Committee for
Doctoral Students and forwarded to the University Committee, which has the
final say in approving the proposal. When the University Committee approves
the proposal, is the student ready to move on to the advanced stage. |
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18. |
What
happens if the proposal is rejected?
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If the Committee cannot
approve the proposal, it may be rejected entirely, in which case the student's
status as a doctoral candidate is cancelled; but it may also be returned to
the student and the advisor for revisions and resubmission. If the revised
proposal is also rejected, then the student's status as a doctoral candidate
is cancelled. |
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19. |
How long
is the doctoral thesis?
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The official
recommendation is that it be no longer than 250 pages. |
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20. |
Who
evaluates the doctoral thesis and what is the approval process?
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The work is initially evaluated
by the advisor(s), who submit their professional opinion to the Committee for
Doctoral Students. The Committee then contacts two additional judges, in One must take into
account that reading a doctoral dissertation takes months (the judges have a
3 month timeframe to do so, but only a small number of them meet it). The
Committee for Doctoral Students does its best to avoid delay, and strives to
meet at least once a month. If one or more of the judges
see the need for corrections, the dissertation will be returned to the
student for revision. The revised copy will then be passed on to the relevant
judge for review. After she or he has approved it, the dissertation will be
reviewed by the Departmental Committee, and when it is approved, it will be
passed on to the University Committee for Doctoral Students. Upon the
University Committee's approval, notice will be sent to the University
Senate; if no appeal is offered within 10 days of the notice, the student
will be eligible for the title "Dr. of Philosophy". |
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21 |
Is there
a direct course of study for a PhD degree, which allows students to pursue
their doctoral studies while completing an MA. How can I apply?
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Information is
available at the guidelines for
the direct course of study for a PhD. |