35 PhD students appear for comprehensive oral examination

35 students from the African Center of Excellence have appeared to the Doctoral Committee for a comprehensive oral examination. According to UR regulations, a Ph.D. student should appear to the Doctoral Committee for a comprehensive oral examination to present his/her extensive research proposal and research progress.

This oral comprehensive research tests the fitness of the candidate to proceed further with his/her Ph.D. work. During this exercise, if the candidate’s performance is satisfactory, his/her registration is confirmed with Doctoral Candidature. If he/she fails, the candidate is given one more opportunity to appear for the examination within six months.

While officially opening this exercise, the Principal of the College of Science and Technology Dr. Ignace Gatare said that Ph.D. requires patience and determination and requested the candidates to keep on focused.  “Ph.D. is all about passion, it's an exercise of critical thinking where you agree to disagree... therefore, it requires a lot of patience to be able to solve an existing problem”, he said.

With this exercise, candidates are assessed on the ability to identify the core issue/s or problem/s within the case, seek appropriate and sufficient information to understand the issue/problem, observe interactions that may complicate the management of the issue/problem among others.

The Doctoral Committee is made of Main Supervisor, Internal/External Expert from Academic Institutions, External expert from Academic/Industry/ Research Institutions, Resident Co-Supervisor (Convenor), Director of ACE/ Head of Ph.D. Studies of ACE.