Senior Honors Thesis Project

Theses Archived in Digital Repository

In December 2012, the TCU Library--in cooperation with Honors College administration--began the process of archiving Honors students' senior theses in its digital repository. Previously, accepted honors theses were housed in Special Collections in print format.

The library has been storing theses and dissertations for graduate students in this manner for several years. Doing so makes it easy for students to submit their work and for library and academic staff to process and approve these submissions. More importantly, archiving scholarly work in digital repositories creates visibility for authors, provides better access to the university's intellectual output and may allow students to develop multimedia digital theses.

As part of this project, library staff developed an online submission and review tool to facilitate both Honors College and library workflows. Honors students login using their TCU username, upload their digital files and enter some information about their work and thesis committee. Committee members (notified of the submission via e-mail) login, review, and approve the submission. Honors College administrators are able to manage submissions and track the review process. After the approval process, documents are exported in a format conducive to library cataloging and addition to the digital repository.

Thirteen submissions were received and processed for December 2012 graduates, and their documents are currently being catalogued by library staff. Approximately 90 submissions are expected towards the end of the Spring 2013 semester.

Volume 25, no. 2

CONTENTS

Theses Archived in Digital Repository