The EsDUVa will notify each member of the thesis examination board of their appointment, making available to them the doctoral thesis, the doctoral student's activities document, the reports from external experts and, where appropriate, the doctoral student's response to said reports.
After a minimum of three teaching days after the aforementioned notification, the secretary of the examination board will send notification of the date and time of the defence via the email address tesis.escuela.doctorado@uva.es, indicating the place (or URL if the defence is online), the date and time of the event. The defence announcement form may be used for this purpose.
The defence will be announced on the EsDUVA website at least three teaching days before the it takes place. The Doctoral School will send an email to the secretary of the thesis examination board with the documents and instructions to be followed.
The defence will take place in a public session, either in person or online during the academic period. It must be scheduled within three months after the appointment of the thesis examination board.
- Face-to-face defence. This will be held at any centre of the University of Valladolid. If any of the examination board members are unable to attend, it may be possible to arrange their attendance by videoconference.
- Online defence. The defence may be held online, with all the participants attending by videoconference, provided that this is authorised by the president of the Doctoral Thesis Committee, by delegation of the latter.
If necessary, in order for the defence to be public, the secretary of the examination board will inform the Doctoral School at tesis.escuela.doctorado@uva.es of the URL of the online session in which the defence will take place. There will be no password, so as to allow the public to attend online. The URL will be published with the announcement of the call for the defence session.
- The minutes of the session will be drawn up by the secretary and signed by the three members of the thesis examination board.
The minutes of the thesis defence, the reports issued by each member of the examination board, as well as identifications and signature delegations, if any, will be sent to the EsDUVa within a maximum period of five working days after the defence ceremony. To do so, it must be taken into account that all the documents must be signed either digitally or by hand, but that it is not possible to mix the two types of signature (i.e. one document cannot have a handwritten signature and another a digital signature).
Documents can be sent in two ways, depending on the chosen modality:
- If all the documents have been signed digitally, they will be sent by e-mail to escuela.doctorado@uva.es.
- If all the documents have been signed by hand, they will be sent through the GEISER electronic registry service as a CERTIFIED TRUE COPY. This electronic registration system can be found in the registration offices of the Palacio de Santa Cruz, Casa del Estudiante and in the secretary's office of the centre where the defence took place.
If the grade awarded is that of outstanding, each member of the examination board will have access to a survey that they will receive by e-mail from the Doctoral School.
In this anonymous survey, two actions are necessary:
a) Casting a secret vote to award the "cum laude" mention, if applicable.
b) Giving an assessment of the scientific quality of the thesis, which will be taken into account if the new doctoral student applies for the outstanding doctorate award.
At a public session chaired by the head of the EsDUVa or the person delegated by them for this purpose, the votes cast by the members of the examination board to award the “cum laude” mention will be counted. The result of the vote and the average grade of the marks awarded by the members of the examination board will be recorded in the minutes. These minutes must be taken into account when applying for the outstanding doctorate award.
This will take place by videoconference and will be held in public session every Monday or, if it is a public holiday, on the first following working day. Anyone interested in attending should send an e-mail to tesis.escuela.doctorado@uva.es on the Friday of the previous week before 14:00 hours.
Award of the "cum laude" mention will be published on the EsDUVa website.
From the following day, the doctoral degree may be applied for.