PhD Proposal Review
Each PhD student in the FMHS is required to present their PhD research proposal / protocol to a review panel, and afterwards, to make all the changes required by the panel in order to finalise the proposal for compulsory submission to an SU Research Ethics Committee.
Preparing for the Review
The student refers to the FMHS Doctoral Proposal Writing Guide and works closely with the supervisor/s to complete a well-supported and polished research protocol, ideally within five to six months, producing a Turnitin similarity report on the final version;
Consult the Biostatistics Unit / Animal Research Facility, if relevant.
The supervisor - about 4 to 6 weeks prior to the review - contacts the Doctoral Office.
The Doctoral Office allocates a CPR representative and, in the case of a study to be considered by the HREC, requests allocation of an HREC representative (allow 3 to 4 weeks for the latter). For this purpose, submit the Review Checklist, having completed only page 2 and where relevant, the HREC addendum.
The supervisor (meanwhile) requests HoD approval of the draft Review Checklist. Attach CVs of the student and any proposed external supervisors and/or review panel members for the HoD, together with any pre-existing ethics approval/s.
Head of Division to approve the panel and draft Review Checklist before review date is set and review chair distributes documents to the approved panel with 2 weeks' notice.
Proposal Review Document Stack
Review Panel
After the Review
Each review panel should have the following members:
Review chair, who distributes the set of documents to all panel members by two weeks prior to the review and finally completes the Form A3 Review Checklist (after the review).
One or more domain expert, who each complete the reviewer form.
(In the case of a review for the purpose of Conversion, one of the domain experts must be external to SU.)Ethics representative, who scrutinises the full proposal and completes the relevant section of the Review Checklist before the review.
(Any member of most suitable Research Ethics Committee (REC) may be approached; except in the case of the HREC. The Doctoral Office facilitates a request for HREC representation on receipt of a supervisor request, 4 to 6 weeks prior to the review.)CPR representative, who monitors the procedure on behalf of the Faculty - allocated by the Tygerberg Doctoral Office ([email protected]).
Supervisors usually attend doctoral reviews as non-participating observers.
After successful completion of the review, the main, internal supervisor emails the following five PDF-format documents to the Tygerberg Doctoral Office ([email protected]) in a single email, copying the candidate:
- Supervisor confirmation that all review requirements were met, listing the changes
- Fully completed and signed Review Checklist
- All reviewer comments with an indication of how each was addressed
- Final, edited proposal for ethics submission, with review changes highlighted (and not in track changes)
- Turnitin report on the final proposal (similarity score of no more than 15%)
As soon as the Tygerberg Doctoral Office has received all the required review documents in good order, a letter will be prepared to facilitate the ethics application - usually within two workdays.
We wish you success with the proposal review and ethics application.