Once a PhD student has formalized the first enrolment for academic supervision in the PhD programme and the tutor and thesis supervisor have been assigned, a supervision agreement must be signed.
What it is.
The supervision commitment is a document that establishes the supervisory functions for doctoral students and that includes a procedure for dealing with disputes. It also covers aspects related to intellectual or industrial property rights that may arise in a doctoral thesis, and includes a clause in which the signatories commit to comply with the Doctoral School’s Code of Good Practice. Similarly, signatories undertake to familiarise themselves with and to respect the rights and obligations of each party in the “Rules governing the UVA Doctoral School", Rules governing doctoral studies at the University of Valladolid and the European Charter for Researchers.
Who signs.
The parties who sign the document are: the doctoral student, the supervisor of the doctoral thesis, the tutor, and the coordinator of the doctoral programme.
When it is signed.
- Once a PhD student has formalized the first supervision enrolment in the PhD programme and a thesis supervisor has been assigned.
- Should a new thesis supervisor or tutor for the doctoral student be appointed, a new supervision agreement will have to be signed.
Procedure.
A few days after the student first enrols in the doctoral programme, or a few days after the academic committee of the doctoral programme notify of a change of thesis supervisor or tutor, the signing of this document will be managed through the UVa Portafirmas as follows:
- The doctoral student will receive an invitation to sign the document electronically in the UVa Portafirmas via their institutional student e-mail. They will only have to click on the link and sign it. To be able to sign, the doctoral student will first need to activate the institutional e-mail (identificador@estudiantes.uva.es), have an electronic signature and to have installed the Autofirma application.
- The thesis supervisor will then receive notification from the Portafirmas application to sign the same document electronically.
- The tutor will later receive said notification.
- Finally, the doctoral programme coordinator will sign in the Portafirmas.
When the process has concluded, a new tab will be available in the doctoral tracking application –called “documents”– where the signed document can be seen. In this section, there may be two or more documents if there has been a change of thesis supervisor and/or tutor.
Important: This document must be signed by all parties within three months after formal enrolment in doctoral studies.
Special procedure to be followed in the event of an electronic signature not being possible.
The handwritten signature of all the parties involved may only be used to sign the supervision commitment when the doctoral student and thesis supervisor do not have a DNI or NIE and –consequently– cannot obtain an electronic signature.
Handwritten signatures and electronic signatures cannot be mixed in the same document, since this document would lack validity.
Once the document has been handwritten and signed by all the parties involved, it must be presented at the registry office of any public organisation (including the university, city council, embassies, etc.) and addressed to the Doctoral School of the University of Valladolid.
The DIR3 code of the Doctoral School of the University of Valladolid is U01900041. The postal address of the Doctoral School is: Casa del Estudiante- Calle Real de Burgos s/n, 47011 - Valladolid (Valladolid).
The documents will thus reach the EsDUVA through GEISER and will have been digitized in a certified manner, such that certified true electronic copies that can be included in the electronic file will be available to the EsDUVa.
N.B.: it is not possible to send the supervision commitment by e-mail or by any other procedure.