Master Thesis II: Extended Essay

18 ECTS credits
540 h study time

Offer 1 with catalog number 4022247FNR for all students in the 1st and 2nd semester at a (F) Master - specialised level.

Semester

1st and 2nd semester

Enrollment based on exam contract

Impossible

Grading method

Grading (scale from 0 to 20)

Can retake in second session

Yes

Enrollment Requirements

De student is ingeschreven in de Master in de Rechten en neemt de Masterproef pas als laatste onderdeel op in het studietraject. De student heeft tevens een credit verworven voor het studiedeel "Masterproef I: toegepast juridisch en rechtsvergelijkend onderzoek".

Taught in

Dutch

Faculty

Faculty of Law and Criminology

Department

Metajuridica

Educational team

Frederik Dhondt (course titular)

Activities and contact hours

540 contact hours Independent or External Form of Study

Course Content

After the successful completion of the course unit 'Master's Thesis I: Research Plan', the course unit 'Master's Thesis II: Thesis' follows, which includes the writing of a master's thesis, possibly followed by an oral defense.

Through the MaThiS platform, the student must submit a request for a master's thesis topic and for a supervisor no later than November 15 of the graduation year. This is preferably the topic that was chosen in Master Thesis I and on which the research plan was written.

The supervisor's approval is granted through Mathis within ten calendar days of application, which automatically includes the required communication to the Dean.

If a subject and supervisor do not apply on time, the submission date of the master's thesis automatically moves to the next submission date (Art. 120 §1 Education and Examination Regulations).

The registration in MaThis is separate from the necessary registration in the SelfService students for the course unit Master's thesis in accordance with Art. 108.

The student is supervised by the supervisor under whose supervision the student prepared the research plan in 'Master's Thesis I', but can also turn to the Master's Thesis coordinator for further methodological support.

One lecture is organized by the master's thesis coordinator, in which the guidelines for writing a master's thesis in law are discussed. These guidelines are communicated to the students at the beginning of the academic year.

In the above-mentioned lecture, the learning outcomes, the deadlines and the possible oral defense are discussed.

Additional info

The guidelines for writing a Master's thesis in law school, which can be consulted on the faculty website and the Canvas learning platform, contain all the information that is important for successfully completing the Master's thesis.

The submission dates, the guidelines for drawing up the master's thesis plan, as well as all other information concerning the procedures to be followed and important dates can be found in the VUB education and examination regulations with faculty supplements (faculty RC), and also in the master's thesis brochure ('Master's Thesis Guidelines') which is made available on Canvas.

Learning Outcomes

General competencies

In 'Master's Thesis II: Thesis' the following learning outcomes are taught and evaluated.

The students have specialized knowledge within one or more legal domains: civil and procedural law, criminology, economic law, international and European law, tax law, public law, social law and/or criminal law.
They can think and act independently and critically, as well as learn and work independently.
With respect to scientific research in their discipline, students master the thought process of qualification, interpretation and consideration, and are familiar with the principles of argumentation. They can independently and scientifically address and elaborate on a legal topic.
They also have demonstrated analytical, synthetic, and problem-solving skills at the academic level.
The students can communicate their research results to laymen and peers, clearly articulating their positions and daring to enter into discussion. In doing so, they can argue logically and correctly in law and defend their position.
The students can consult sources in French, and can follow, understand and summarize explanations in that language.
The students are also familiar with the skills and techniques required to draft legal texts clearly and in a coherent structure, taking into account their objectives, and are able to criticize them. They will present the results of their research in a clear, logical, and coherently constructed written report.

Grading

The final grade is composed based on the following categories:
Master Thesis determines 100% of the final mark.

Within the Master Thesis category, the following assignments need to be completed:

Masterproef with a relative weight of 100 which comprises 100% of the final mark.

Additional info regarding evaluation

I. THE MASTER'S THESIS WILL BE EVALUATED BASED ON THE FOLLOWING CRITERIA:

A. the problem statement or research question;

The student succeeds in formulating the problem statement in a clear manner.
The student succeeds in formulating a clear research question or questions.
The student justifies the relevance of the research question or problem statement.
The student uses a relevant research approach.

B. literature review and source research;

The student succeeds in purposefully providing an overview of primary and secondary sources relevant to the research.
The student will succeed in placing the research within the relevant sources of law.
The student succeeds in writing an integrated analysis of the relevant sources of law (not an enumeration of authors or judgments).
The student succeeds in incorporating, to the extent relevant to the topic, local as well as European, foreign and international sources of law.

C. Content;

The student succeeds in testing the insights of the research against the research question/problem statement.
The student succeeds in taking an independent position within the academic/legal debate and in adequately justifying this position.
The student demonstrates that he/she has acquired a thorough knowledge and understanding of the field of his/her research.

D. Written representation of research findings;

The student succeeds in answering the question.
The student succeeds in synthetically synthesizing his/her major findings.
The student succeeds in presenting research findings based on rules of argumentation.
The student succeeds in presenting results in an academically responsible manner.

E. language use, grammar, spelling, and style.

The student succeeds in expressing his/her argument carefully and linguistically correctly.
The student uses a writing style appropriate for a master's thesis.
The student succeeds in designing the master's thesis professionally (title page, layout, house style).
The student uses a reference system correctly (Q&A or for foreign or international law sources an equivalent reference system, e.g., OSCOLA)

II. THE MASTER'S THESIS WILL BE GRADED ACCORDING TO THE FOLLOWING SCALE OF VALUES:

0-9 "Unsatisfactory" The learning objectives were not met. The work did not reach the required standard. Causes may include that the work does not answer the research question; that it is based on insufficient research; there are substantial errors; the argumentation and analysis is flawed or lacking. The decision to evaluate a master's thesis as unsatisfactory should be justified in detail.

10-12 "Satisfactory" The paper has reached the required standard but only with limited or superficial analysis; does not reflect the various opinions and views in the literature; is not based on a comprehensive source study. There may also be flaws in argumentation, references, style and language, or bibliography.

13-14 "Good" The master's thesis includes a clear and coherent analysis; there is a clear problem statement of a legal and/or socially relevant issue; there is critical understanding of the subject matter and research methods; a relevant literature review has been conducted; the master's thesis achieves the required level in terms of language, style, presentation and references.

15-16 "Very Good" The student succeeds well in planning and conducting the research independently; the master's thesis demonstrates and broad and relevant literature review; the student succeeds in including relevant concepts and theories in the analysis; the student succeeds in developing a complex and intelligent argument; there is an advanced understanding of the relevant sources with a relevant balance between factual details and the relevant views. Original sources and underlying assumptions and arguments are questioned and evaluated; language, style, and references are correct.

17-20 "Excellent": The student demonstrates great skill in independently developing a relevant research question, and planning and conducting the research. The student demonstrates a high level of skill in evaluating the literature and theory and succeeds in making independent judgments about them. The student achieves a high level of creativity, originality and independence in his/her thinking. The student is able to critically evaluate research methods and is able to propose new angles of approach. The student demonstrates a great capacity for critical analysis. The master's thesis achieves a very high standard in terms of language, style, presentation and references.

III ORAL DEFENCE

An oral defense takes place in the following circumstances:

at the request of the student;

After receiving the reports and the quotations from the supervisor and the commissioner through MaThiS, the student has a period of three calendar days to request an oral defense. This period begins on the day following receipt of the reports and quotations. Within that period, the student shall send a request to the master's thesis coordinator of the law program at facrc@vub.be. The supervisor, the commissioner and the student shall be informed of the oral defence by e-mail.

The difference in the grading of the supervisor and the commissioner is more than four points;

When the Master's thesis coordinator of the law programme establishes that the difference in grading between the supervisor and the commissioner is more than four points, he/she decides that an oral defence will take place. The supervisor, the commissioner and the student shall be informed of this by e-mail.

at the decision of the Master's thesis coordinator of the law programme, after a justified request to that effect from the supervisor or the statutory auditor.

If the Master's thesis coordinator decides that an oral defense should take place, the supervisor, the commissioner and the student shall be informed of this by e-mail.

When an oral defense takes place, at the end of the oral defense, the master thesis jury makes an assessment and gives a final grade based on the rating scale used for the evaluation of the master thesis.

When no oral defense takes place, the supervisor and commissioner's assessment and grading, as recorded in MaThiS, become final.

The two grades are combined and reduced to a 20-point result.

If the student has not submitted a master's thesis in the first term, in accordance with the Education and Examination Regulations, or has not passed the course unit in the first term, he or she must submit a (reworked) master's thesis no later than August 16.

For the assessment and grading, the same procedure is used as in the first session.

Allowed unsatisfactory mark

The supplementary Teaching and Examination Regulations of your faculty stipulate whether an allowed unsatisfactory mark for this programme unit is permitted.

Academic context