Licentiate degree

A Licentiate degree corresponds to 120 ECTS credits, broken down into a thesis contribution of 60 - 90 ECTS credits and contributions from academic courses. The Licentiate may be a degree in its own right or a stage in the program towards a PhD. As a part of the PhD criteria at the Department of Physics it is mandatory to fulfill the requirements of the Licentiate degree or complete a dedicated half-time review procedure.

For a Licentiate degree the students must write and present a Licentiate thesis at a seminar, which is scrutinized by an opponent. The Licentiate as well as the PhD thesis can either be a monograph or as a collection of separate articles. In the latter case the thesis consists of an overview summary and referenced articles published in scientific magazines.
Some important things about the thesis content:

There must be a summary in Swedish.
The contribution of the PhD student to the papers has to be clearly stated.

Apart from those copies that the student keeps for distributions among colleagues and friends, the supervisor, the opponent and members of the committee should each have a copy. The responsible administrator at Fysikum should also have a number of copies (see contacts below).

Moreover, there should be 10 copies of the thesis available at the Licentiate seminar. The date of the Licentiate seminar must be posted at least 3 weeks in advance. At the same time the printed copies of the thesis should be distributed.

How to publish Licentiatethesis in DIVA (1282 Kb)

Degree goals that must be met for a licentiate degree

From appendix 2 of högskoleförordningen

What follows is a translation from the original text in Swedish which is the binding document.

Goals

Knowledge and understanding

For the Degree of Licentiate the third-cycle student shall

demonstrate knowledge and understanding of the research field, including up-to-date specialised knowledge in a limited area of the field, demonstrate familiarity with research methodology in general and the methods of the specific field of research in particular.

Competence and skills

For the Degree of Licentiate the third-cycle student shall
•   demonstrate the ability to identify and formulate issues with scholarly precision critically, autonomously and creatively, and within a limited field plan as well as using appropriate methods to undertake research and other qualified tasks within predetermined time frames and to review and evaluate such work.
•   demonstrate the ability in both national and international contexts to present and discuss research and research findings clearly in speech and writing and in dialogue with the academic community and society in general.
•   demonstrate the abililty needed to participate autonomously in research and development work and to autonomously participate in other qualified professional activities.

Judgement and approach

For the Degree of Licentiate the third-cycle student shall

demonstrate the ability to make assessments of research ethics,
demonstrate insight into the possibilities and limitations of research, its role in society and the responsibility of the individual for how it is used, and
demonstrate the ability to identify the need for further knowledge and the ability to assume the responsability for development of personal skills.

Rules and time-critical preparation

Procedure of the licentiate examination (According to FS decision 2017-12-14)

In order to verify that 50% of the requirements for a PhD exam are satisfied, all PhD students must write and defend a licentiate thesis after approximately two years of full-time studies.

The licentiate thesis is presented, discussed and graded at a seminar.

Financial conditions

One should strive to find a local opponent when the licentiate thesis is presented. In cases where an external opponent is engaged the research project or the research division carries the travel- and lodging costs of the opponent. In cases when the projectvleader decides to remunerate the opponent the remuneration should (according to Stockholm University regulations) be one or two "professorstimmar".

Six months before the seminar

Six months before the sudent is at the half-way point (corresponding to two years full-time studies) the director of studies or the subject responsible arranges a meeting with the student and the supervisor. At the meeting a number of items are discussed: the contents of the licentiate thesis, how much and what type of work remains to be done and the plan to achieve this. Also discussed are practical details regarding the examination, such as deadlines. The intention is that after this meeting there should be a clear plan for what remains to be done, and when it must be completed, for the student to be able to present a licentiate thesis. A preliminary date for the seminar is typically decided at this meeting.

At least 6 weeks before the seminar

The supervisor submits the application form for the Licentiate exam to the subject responsible. In the application the supervisor proposes an expert examiner, who also acts as opponent at the seminar, and an official reader ("granskare"), as well as time and place for the seminar. The expert as well as the official reader should have a doctoral degree and must not have published together with the respondent or supervisor (within the specific area of the thesis) over the past five years.

The application form can be obtained here:

Ansökan om licentitatprov

At the same time a preliminary version of the thesis should be given to the subject responsible and the appointed official reader ("granskare").

At least 4 weeks before the seminar

The official reader provides feedback to the student and supervisor of what, if anything, needs to be improved/changed before the final version of the thesis is made. At that time the official reader gives a written evaluation to the subject responsible. This evaluation should contain a recommendation as to whether the student should be allowed to present the thesis at the planned date, or if more work is needed before then.
After conferring with the official reader the subject responsible decides whether the Licentiate examination should go ahead as planned. In case it is decided that the thesis needs to be revised the subject responsible, in agreement with the student and the supervisor, decides on a new preliminary date for the seminar. No later than five weeks before that date the student has to deliver a revised version of the thesis to the official reader. Within one week the reader gives a written recommendation to the subject responsible as to whether or not that version can be presented at the seminar.

At least 3 weeks before the seminar

When the subject responsible has approved the thesis for submission and fixed the date for the seminar, the student should distribute the final version of the thesis to the opponent, the official reader, the examiner and the subject responsible no later than three weeks before that date. At the same time the announcement sheet ("spikblad") of the thesis is handed in to the responsible administrator by the respondent. The administrator announces the seminar on Fysikum’s website and on the digital billboard at the entrance to AlbaNova, and distributes the thesis to other departments of the mathematics-physics section and to departments at other universities.

The supervisor/respondent is responsible for ensuring that the opponent, the reader and the examiner are called to the seminar and that they each receive a printed of the thesis.

The abstract/summary and the full text of the thesis shall be put in to the DiVA system ("länk 1") at least three weeks before the seminar.

The seminar can take place in the time period August 15th to June 15th only. The period June 16th - August 14th cannot be part of the three week announcement period (see below).

N.B: All licentiate theses are checked with a plagiarism tool to verify that they do not contain copied work.

A template for the announcement sheet is available on the internal home page, see below. This is a proposal, but all the information specified in the proposal is mandatory.

Use of Artificial Intelligence

The department applies the following temporary rules for use of AI when authoring the thesis.

it is permitted to use AI-systems to improve the language of a thesis.
if this has been done it is imperative to state in the thesis that this has been done, and also list what software has been used and what instructions were issued. Failing to do so will result in the thesis being graded "fail".
it is the responsibility of the student to verify that the external software has only made changes motivated by spelling and grammar.

We note that it can be difficult to restrict the software to modifications of language only. The examination of a thesis where AI has been used to improve the language will therefore most likely be scrutinised extra carefully to ensure that the student is the originator of the scientific content.

Division of responsabilities

Licentiate seminar - division of responsibilities (56 Kb)

The seminar

The examiner, the opponent and the official reader are all present during the Licenciate seminar, and the supervisor acts as chairperson. The seminar is public.

Presentation of the dissertation. The respondent presents her/his thesis for about 30 – 40 minutes. Thereafter the opponent examines the thesis via questions and discussion with the respondent. This part is typically about 30 – 40 minutes long. This is followed by questions from other participants at the seminar.

Grading (pass or non-pass) is made immediately after the seminar. The examiner decides on the grade after discussions with the supervisor, the opponent and the official reader. The decision protocol is brought to the meeting by the examiner. The signed protocol is delivered by the supervisor to the student office at the department for registration in Ladok.

After the seminar

When the seminar and the required courses are registered in Ladok the respondent may apply for the Licentiate Degree. The date of the degree will be identical to the application date (and e.g. not to the date of the seminar).

Apply for the degree certificate