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--- blog:thesis [2026/09/04 10:42] – simon
+++ blog:thesis [2026/09/04 11:34] (current) – simon
@@ Line 55: / Line 55: @@
 ===Supervisors (First/Second,Internal/External)===
-==General aspects==
+==General aspects: Listed examiners==
 A Master thesis at RWTH needs two supervisors, a mini thesis only needs one.
 Any supervisor must be listed at RWTH administration office (ZHV) as examiner. All Professors of RWTH are by definition examiners as well as all Jülich Professors with affiliation to RWTH (which is the case for most of them, but not all!).
-You may check if a Jülich Professor is affiliated with RWTH by typing **the last name(!)** in [[RWTH contacts]|https://rwthcontacts.rwth-aachen.de/persons].
+You may check if a Jülich Professor is affiliated with RWTH by typing **the last name(!)** in [[https://rwthcontacts.rwth-aachen.de/persons|RWTH contacts]]. If you find the person there it has an affiliation with RWTH.
+Any person not being a Professor, e. g. PostDocs, group leaders etc., generally are not listed as examiners with the exception that Professors may appoint PostDocs as Second examiners with limited rights: They may only act as examiners with an appropriate regular examiner (Prof.) going in for the lead.
+==Special case: External Master thesis==
+Other than for the students in the German master courses who are only allowed to do external theses if there is a proven cooperation with the external institute/company students of MatEng have much broader options for external theses.
-All Profs. of our department AND all Professors involved in teaching in Materials Engineering (International profile) are examiners by definition. Any Professors outside our department are generally external supervisors. There are rare exceptions of Professors with affiliation to two faculties, in this case sentence 1 of this paragraph is valid.
+In turn, in order to ensure that the 30 CP assigned to the thesis are equivalent to a regular internal thesis the examination board is stricter about internal supervision. The internal supervisor is responsible for maintaining this equivalence.
-Professors may have PostDocs of their institutes be appointed as second examiners.
+By definition all regular Profs. of our department AND all Professors involved in teaching in Materials Engineering (International profile), e. g. being located in Jülich, are examiners.
+Any Professors outside our department are generally external supervisors. There are rare exceptions of Professors with affiliation to two faculties, in this case sentence 1 of this paragraph is valid. You may check which Professors are affiliated with our department of the department´s webpage.
+The mark is given by both, the internal supervisor and the on-site supervisor.
 Formally, the directly supervising person (mostly Ph. D. students) is of no relevance.
-Profs. outside the department can also be first supervisors. In this case the second supervisor should be a regular Prof. of our department, he will be in charge of all formal issues with regard to ZPA. Please note that there are a few Professors from other departments active in teaching in Mat. Eng., e. g. in the core selection area. These Professors may act as internal supervisors though they are not members of our department.
 **Please note:** There is no rule against one Professor being the supervisor of mini thesis AND Master thesis. However, it is not intended that you do all theses works at the same institute/on the same topic. This will narrow down your academic profile which may be helpful if you want to pursue a career in this specific field but may impede job offers from other related fields.
@@ Line 102: / Line 103: @@
   * in industry.
 In case of a student mini thesis no theses in industry are permitted. Student min theses at any institute of RWTH are possible.
-A Master thesis can also be done in industry. In any case this requires at first (prior to starting the thesis) an application to the examnination board asking for a permission to do the thesis externally, signed by the student AND the supervisor. In the form the external company/institute needs to be named as well as a contact person at this facility.
+A Master thesis can also be done in industry. In any case this requires **at first (prior to starting the thesis)** an application to the examnination board asking for a permission to do the thesis externally. This is to be submitted via paperless.
+Thesis supervision is an issue with external theses, see above.
+==Important notice:==
+__The department needs to offer thesis topics to students of MatEng per definition. Hence, students have the right to get "a topic" but not necessarily the topic you want.
+There is no right for a student to get an external thesis, nor can any Professor be urged to supervise an external thesis.
+Thus, there is no such thing like "I secured a Master thesis at company XY" since this will only be possible if you secure Professors willing to supervise it.__
-In any case  an internal supervisor (Prof. of our department) is required that takes the responsibility to make sure that the external thesis is equivalent to a regular internal one.
-The supervisor acts like a regular internal supervisor and registers the thesis with ZPA using the form from the department´s webpage.
-The mark is given by both, the internal supervisor and the on-site supervisor.
 A student looking for an internal supervisor for an external thesis should look for a Prof. with an expertise in the field of the intended thesis. In case of doubt please check with the closest Prof. first. In case this Prof. feels unable to supervise the thesis he/she will be able to redirect you to a colleague.