Thesis and Project Requirements
Overview of COML 680
Students who are in their last semester of coursework in the Communication and Leadership program should register on Zagweb for COML 680 (Communication & Leadership Seminar). COML 680 is scheduled to last over an entire semester, Fall or Spring (the seminar is not offered during the Summer). The longer length is designed to give the graduating student more time for reflection and writing, a key aspect of this integrative capstone course. Students should still be able to take a course in either Session A or Session B of the same semester that COML 680 is taken. Each student has the option of completing a Communication Theis or a Communication Project.
Guidelines
Assignment: You are to select a topic in COMMUNICATION and write a thesis (not less than 30, nor more than 75 pages, including your bibliography and supported by communication theory and philosophy. The thesis or project must meet all the requirements regarding content as listed in the structure and format sections of this guide. In addition, your literature review must have a minimum of twenty-five sources. The sources must include at least ten from scholarly professional journals. A list of possible Communication and Leadership journals will be provided. Web sources should be carefully limited and must be based primarily on scholarly professional journals.
The thesis will be written under the guidance of a faculty "mentor/chair." Your mentor can be any member of the regular faculty at Gonzaga University. It is crucial that your mentor be familiar with the area you would like to research, the method you would like to use, and the specific requirements of your assignment. It is your obligation to share all of this with your mentor. A list of faculty mentors is on the COML Faculty web page.
Requirements
You must write a five page proposal of your project or thesis, including what your proposed topic is, a clear statement of the problem and importance of the project or thesis, a description of the area of communication theory this project or thesis emerges, the method you intend to use to collect your research, and a minimum of ten substantive source bibliography to support your ideas written in correct APA format. We suggest you confer with your Mentor before you write the proposal.
Planning Schedule for Writing Your Thesis Project
It is useful to realize ahead of time the stages that are involved in project or thesis preparation:
1. Establishing the preliminary focus of the study or project.
2. Finding a mentor and discussing preliminary ideas.
3. Agreeing on topic and signing and submitting Mentor Agreement to your 680 Professor.
4. Selecting research methods.
5. Developing research and collecting data.
6. Ordering the data and Analyzing the data.
7. Writing up your Literature Review.
8. Completing the study and submitting the chapters of the project or thesis for review.
9. Preparing and making oral presentation.
Thesis and Project Requirements PowerPoint
