The Research Student Career (2)

During the admissions process all candidates are allocated a college place either through the college selection process or the admissions clearing house. Although students are able to stipulate a first and second college preference, there is no guarantee that they will get a place in their college of choice. Generally speaking, to reject a college offer is to reject the university offer as a whole. However once college selection has been made a candidate may under some circumstances request to change – or migrate – to another college. The migration process is generally handled at college level. The candidate will require approval from both colleges involved, and the Proctors may also need to be informed (Examination Regulations 2010, p. 12). In practice permission to migrate is rarely given. By far the most common grounds for successful applications is financial. If a college makes an offer of funding to a student who is resident in another college, and a condition of that funding is relocation, then this is generally approved. Students might also apply on other strong grounds e.g. disabled access or facilities, strong religious feelings etc. Personal preference or inclination would not be upheld as grounds for migration.

For the GSA the process is largely one of liaison. Once the necessary approvals have been obtained from the colleges involved the student record needs to be updated. Email the Data Quality Team (DQT@admin.ox.ac.uk) with all the available information.

While studying at Oxford students are required to live close to the city (within a 25 mile radius of Carfax Tower) for a stipulated period of time – known as statutory residence. Generally MSc students are required to remain in statutory residence for three terms, whereas MPhil and D.Phil students are expected to complete six terms. However if a D.Phil candidate has already fulfilled the residence requirements for a previous masters' degree they are only required to complete a further three terms of statutory residence, subject to approval from department/Division. A faculty board / department / Division may, in exceptional circumstances and with the support of the student’s supervisor and college, grant dispensation (not more than 3 terms) from such residence on the grounds that it is necessary for the student’s work that he or she should be able to study or conduct research elsewhere. This form is managed via On-Course Applications (OCA) and can be accessed by the Student via Student Self Service

Antedated admission is the process by which a student’s period of graduate study at another university is accepted as counting towards their residence requirement and fee liability at Oxford.  Antedated admission is only available to students transferring to Oxford University from another university with their supervisor.  The supervisor would normally be moving to Oxford to take up employment as a member of academic staff.  Antedated admission is only available at the time of the supervisor’s transfer to Oxford.  It is not available at any later date.

Application process

Applicants apply for entry to the University in the usual way, but should be asked to use the paper application form only. This enables the application fee for antedated admissions to be waived, and avoids the papers being processed with the regular admission applications.  Applicants should not use the on-line applications facility. They should complete the standard University graduate admissions paper application form, and provide all the supporting material for the programme of study they wish to be admitted to (as advised in the graduate admissions notes of guidance).  In MPLS, if the applicant has completed more than three terms of study at their previous institution the Division requests supervision reports from their previous institution as well.

The member of academic staff transferring to Oxford is asked to collate all the application(s) in liaison with the Graduate Administrator in the department.  The department must also find a college place for the student(s). Once the applicant has been accepted by the department and a college, the departmental Graduate Administrator then forwards the paperwork with a covering note from the department to the relevant GSA.  This also avoids the papers being processed with the regular admission applications.

The following papers are required from the department:

• copy of application form and all supporting material;
• copy of UAB offer letter;
• copy of college offer letter;
• note from UAB approving antedated admission and setting out the terms to be antedated;
• note from college approving antedated admission and setting out the terms to be antedated;
• For MPLS, if the applicant has completed more than three terms of study at their previous institution, copies of supervision reports from their previous institution;
• a case of support from the responsible departmental officer for graduate admissions, usually the DGS or in some cases the Head of Department, setting out why it is in the candidate’s best interests to transfer institutions, indicating the number of terms to be antedated and hence fees to be waived (bearing in mind that the Student Fees Panel will normally approve applications for up to 3 terms, and in exceptional cases will consider applications for up to a maximum of 6 terms), and commenting on the candidate’s stage in their research.  The department is asked to indicate whether the student will be required to transfer status, or if this will be waived. 

Transfer of Status and Confirmation of Status

If the student has been at their previous university for less than three terms, the University expects the student to undertake transfer of status in their Oxford department.  If the student has passed the equivalent of transfer of status at their former university, documentation needs to be provided showing the result (e.g. the reference from the previous university), and the department should indicate that it accepts the result.

All antedated students are expected to undertake Confirmation of Status at Oxford irrespective of the number of terms to be antedated, and whether they have undertaken a similar review or assessment at their previous university.

Useful web references

Summary of course fee liabilities

University Course Fees 

Fee Status (Home/EU or Overseas) 

Out-housing is generally only relevant to the MPLS and Medical Sciences divisions.  It occurs when students gain permission to undertake research in a ‘well-found’ laboratory outside of Oxford.

Out-housed students are not required to meet the residency requirements, and they are out-housed for the degree in its entirety.  They will still need to have supervision arrangements in place; in the MPLS Division this includes not less than two / three face-to-face meetings, for a total of at least 8 hours per term.

MPLS
To apply for out-housing the student’s supervisor needs to complete the “Out-housed Questionnaire”, and submit it to the Divisional Assistant Registrar, via the Divisional Graduate Studies Officer, to gain divisional approval. The application will then be considered and approved by the Associate Head of Division (Academic), or his/her equivalent. 

When the application has been approved it will then be forwarded to the GSA who needs to complete the process in eVision as stated in the eVision Manual.

A confirmation letter is also sent to the DGS of the student’s department.

Medical Sciences

The student’s department should submit a written case to the Divisional Graduate Studies Office, requesting permission under the following Regulation:

“Students exceptionally permitted to undertake their research in a well-found laboratory outside Oxford shall not be required to keep statutory residence, but must attend for such instruction as the board shall require.”

The GSA should forward this application to the Chair of the Divisional Graduate Studies Committee for approval. Once the Chair has made a decision, the GSA should contact the department and let them know the decision, A copy of the application and the outcome (approved or declined) should be placed on the student’s file.

The GSA needs to complete the process in eVision as stated in the eVision Manual.

Most Oxford theses are made freely available for consultation: this means that any person wishing to read a thesis may do so.  However, in certain special cases a thesis held by the Bodleian library and in ORA (Oxford University Research Archive) is not made available for consultation for a set period. This might be for a number of reasons including the following information being included in the thesis:

•           Patentable material

•           Commercially sensitive information

•           Sensitive personal information

•           An agreement made with the sponsor of the work

•           Publisher restrictions on prior publication

•           Other Intellectual Property Rights

Any student wishing to apply for a thesis embargo must complete form GSO3c ‘Application for Dispensation from Consultation of Thesis’.  Once the form has been approved by the Department/Faculty/Division the GSA should update eVision accordingly and write to the student confirming the dates of the thesis embargo.  The letter should be copied to RDT and to ORA.

All Divisions strongly supports open access to theses produced by its students. However, during this period whilst both authors and publishers adapt to open access, these 3 Divisions have agreed that by default, access to the full text of digital theses will be restricted for three years. Authors should indicate as such on the ORA online deposit form. These students need not apply for restricted access using form GSO.3C. Authors can choose to override this default and make their thesis open access either at deposit or at any time during the three-year embargo. Students who wish to make their thesis freely available on deposit or before the end of the three years should indicate as such on form GSO.3A and on the online ORA deposit form. All students need to indicate if their thesis contains content where copyright is held by a third party and should obtain permission before making such content freely available on the internet.

There are several situations where a programme transfer will have to be carried out in eVision.  A student may decide to switch from the MSt to the longer MPhil, or vice versa.  Another example is when a student starts on the DPhil but decides to change to the lower degree of MSc by Research or MLitt. 

In all these cases the GSO.28 ‘Change of Programme of Study’ form needs to be completed.  Once approved by the Faculty/Department/Division, the GSA needs to write a letter confirming the change to the student, copied to the supervisor and college.  Then the transfer needs to be recorded in eVision.  Full instructions are contained in the eVision Manual.  

Please note: in all cases the Fees Team need to be informed (fee.schedule@admin.ox.ac.uk) so they can make any necessary adjustments to the composition fee amount.

Transferring a student from a taught course to a research course

These programme transfers should be passed on to your Divisional Officers and will need to be processed by DQT (dqt@admin.ox.ac.uk)