Bachelor Thesis

This page documents additional Thesis Requirements from the Supervisor:

Book a Meeting Slot with Me

In case you want to discuss the topic/problems/questions with me, book an appointment via Book time with Wu Hsiang-Yun: Student meeting

Concept Submission (for Scientific Writing):

Note that I am not involved in the lecture “Scientific Writing”. Since I do it voluntarily, if you want me to check your document planned for the lecture “Scientific Writing”, use the concept template provided from the bachelor thesis eCampus page. It is also recommended to use this concept template by the lecturers of “Scientific Writing”. Use the template now so you do not have to do double work for the thesis submission.
Note that the concept you submitted to the lecture “Scientific Writing” is not equal to the concept for the “bachelor thesis” (deadline in October). The concept you will submit in October should fulfill my supervision requirements, while the concept in “Scientific Writing” could be an initial step for it.
It is not necessary to find a completely novel topic for a bachelor thesis, but the research questions you aim for should not be naive and obvious without needing any structured study steps.

Submissions

Concept Submission (deadline in October):

Use the concept template provided by the eCampus page of the bachelor thesis.
Research Question/Objectives
- Please narrow down your research questions to three questions. Specify the challenges and explain if they are missing in the state-of-the-art.
Research Strategy
- It should be a concrete and detailed plan for what you will accomplish in the project. This includes
  - Environment setup (i.e., tools, programming language, software, library, etc., what you plan to use in the project)
  - The concrete methodology pipeline, including input/output, what approaches (algorithms, etc.) you plan to include step by step, the validation/evaluation (no. of participants you plan to recruit) of the proposed methods, and highlight how the proposed method could resolve your research questions and objectives.
  - I will consider this the agreement between us for your project. Please note that my grading will be based on this agreement.

Planning

Use a table (see below) to summarize your schedule.

Propose a time schedule based on the proposed tasks (ex. how long it takes for each task, etc… Also, include the time that you are not available, if any)

Tasks	Weeks	Expected working hours
Literature survey	15.09.2026	4

Do not forget the time (min. twice) to report the current state of the project to me. This can also be done by email updates. Note that this is required and will be considered in the final grading from the university.

Literature
- References relevant to the project (min. 5 most relevant scientific papers)
- Add 2~3 sentences per reference to describe why it is relevant to the project and what you plan to do beyond them.
Method & Implementation
- The implementation setup should be proposed. E.g., what programming languages, tools, sudy setup, etc.
IMPORTANT: When the concept is successfully submitted, I will consider this is an agreement about workload between the student and the supervisor.
IMPORTANT: If you fail one attempt, you cannot submit your next attempt within 8 weeks from the date you receive the grade (university regulation) without talking to the academic director.

Structure Submission (deadline in February):

Use the thesis template provided by the eCampus page of the bachelor thesis.
Itemize all information that will be put in the final thesis, including all chapter names, all section names, potential images if already planned, etc.
For each chapter and section, add 1~2 sentences to describe what you plan to address here.
Research questions and hypotheses addressed in the concept should also be moved here.
Setup table of content and corss-reference for all citations.
If you have a repository for the project (i.e., GitHub, GitLab, etc.), do not forget to put it in the thesis.
If your project contain websites, make them public available and also add URLs in the thesis.

Thesis Submission (various deadlines):

Abstract should follow the order: Background -> Motivation -> Goal -> Method -> Result -> Evaluation -> Cpnclusion
Basic Chapters should include:
- Introduction:
- Related work:
- Overview:
- Method:
- Evaluation and Discussion:
- Conclusion and Future Work:
- Overview of Generative AI Tools Used: (If you use AI for code generation, you will need to mention it in the main text here. You will need to mention what tools you are using, and what prompts you use to generate the content. Pick the core ones and prompts for debugging could be skipped. More details you can look into: https://www.ustp.at/en/mediacenter/pdfs/guidelines-for-the-approach-to-generative-ai-applications.pdf)

Checklist before sending to the supervisor for proofreading

The correct thesis template is in use (You can find the template on the eCampus page).
All the texts have been checked by a proofreader (i.e., Grammarly, etc.).
All images and tables are cross-cited (cross-reference feature) in the main text.
Caption text and equations are styled in italics.
Declaration of Honour is properly checked and referenced in the thesis.
Attend Writing Coaching and receive feedback on the thesis from the experts.
Planned deadline information has been put in the email to the supervisor.

Common Guidelines and Q&A:

My main communication channel for the thesis supervision is email. Usually, I respond to student messages within a week; however, I may accidentally miss an email. Do not hesitate to send me a reminder.
To get my approval and signature
- At least two weeks before the deadline, I should receive the concept/structure/thesis, so I have enough time to check the details.
- Put the deadline of submission in your email to me, so I know how to react accordingly.
- Note that for the final thesis, at least two review rounds will happen in general.
I would like to mention first that to avoid miscommunication, the language I use in my comments will be simple and quite direct. Please do not take it personally.
In scientific writing, avoid phrasal verbs as they are often informal and can have multiple meanings, making the writing less precise and formal. Replace them with single-word verbs or more formal alternatives. e.g., help.
When sending documents (concept/structure/thesis) to me, please send me a shared link to the document (*.doc, *.docx, shared Overleaf link, etc.), so I can directly add comments and monitor the evolution/progress of the document. Do not remove my comments once you update the content so I can track the changes in the 2nd round. If you plan to use tex/latex (strongly recommended if you are interested in proceeding with scientific education/work), I recommend Overleaf in this case, which has powerful review functions.
I strongly recommend participating in the USTP Optional subject - Writing Coaching, so you get professional support in scientific writing.
It is the student’s duty to keep the thesis rolling, not the supervisor. The supervisor will act rather passively, so the students learn project management in practice.
In the meeting with the supervisor, the student should prepare the update of the project progress and drive the open points discussion.
Note that I will refer to the submitted concept as a contract to grade the performance and outcome of the bachelor thesis. I will refer to the structure when grading the scientific writing section of the thesis. If you miss a submission, you will not receive my feedback for that submission. I will still grade the final thesis based on general standards.
Q: Can I change my method written in the concept, if I realize the tool is not practical in the later stage? A: Yes. It is research, so one may change the methods due to unexpcted limitation. However, I do not accept the changes of thesis topic once the concept is submitted.