Information on the defense of master's theses (disputation)

As soon as you have submitted your Master's thesis to the Examination Office, contact the supervisors and make an appointment for disputation. This usually takes place about six weeks after submission of the thesis.

The disputation takes place in front of a commission consisting of the first and second reviewer and a minute-taker. The Disputation is open to the public, but the public can be excluded on request. The Disputation includes a presentation about your work, which should last 20 minutes. This is followed by a discussion on your presentation, in which questions about your presentation and your work are asked. This usually lasts 30 minutes.

The presentation should summarize the most important topics and questions of the work as well as the results. The focus should be on the relevant aspects, since not every detail can be dealt within the given time.

You can use PowerPoint slides or other forms of visualization for the presentation. The use of index cards is also permitted.

In der Aussprache zur Arbeit soll das Thema der Arbeit vertieft werden. Da nicht alle Aspekte im Vortrag angesprochen werden können, erwarten Sie detaillierte Fragen, zum Beispiel zum methodischem Ansatz oder der Relevanz der Arbeit.

The defense is evaluated by a grade, just like the master thesis. If the disputation is not passed, it can be repeated once.