Course Title: Honours Thesis A

Part A: Course Overview

Course Title: Honours Thesis A

Credit Points: 48


Course Code

Campus

Career

School

Learning Mode

Teaching Period(s)

HUSO1225

City Campus

Undergraduate

365H Global Studies, Soc Sci & Plng

Face-to-Face

Sem 2 2007

Course Coordinator: Dr Desmond Mcdonnell

Course Coordinator Phone: +(61 3) 9925 3291

Course Coordinator Email:desmond.mcdonnell@rmit.edu.au


Pre-requisite Courses and Assumed Knowledge and Capabilities

Prerequisites: HUSO 1222, HUSO 1221, HUSO 1224
Corequisite: HUSO 1223


Course Description

Honours Thesis A is a compulsory course in the Honours program for Social Science and Environment Honours students. It requires you to conduct independent research under supervision at a relatively advanced level. It is the major piece of work undertaken during the Honours year and the feature that distinguishes the Honours program from previous undergraduate studies. Its centrality is reflected in the credit points and percentage of the assessment assigned to it. In this course, you will complete your research and move from draft stages and oral progress reports (the latter assessed separately in HUSO1223 Research Progress Workshop) to the submission of the final version.


Objectives/Learning Outcomes/Capability Development

At the completion of this course you will have:

1. Gained experience in the execution of a substantial research project;

2. Acquired familiarity with and understanding of the principal scholarly literature on the topic, and be able to assess the different interpretative perspectives;

3. Demonstrated a capacity to synthesise a range of conceptual and empirical materials;

4. Enhanced your capacity to articulate and organise ideas in a sustained written composition.



Overview of Learning Activities

With the assistance of a supervisor, you will devise the topic, develop it into a full research plan, come to terms with the major existing literature on the subject, investigate new sources/gather data, organise the data, sustain an interpretative discussion, and present the argument in a logical and coherent form. Through this process, you will gain experience in discovery, critical analysis and problem-solving and interpretation, preparatory to taking on the demands of a longer, more sustained project in the form of the postgraduate dissertation.


Overview of Learning Resources

This course is based on individual research under the supervision of a member of the School’s academic staff. Deciding and accessing the appropriate learning resources will be a part of the project itself. Some of this will have been undertaken during first semester preparatory coursework, especially in HUSO1222 Research Methods, and in discussion with individual supervisors. Other resources may be suggested in the seminar that forms a part of HUSO1223 Research Progress Workshop, the corequisite course in second semester.


Overview of Assessment

There will be one assessment task. This will be a research-based monograph of 14,000 to 16,000 words (maximum).