Thesis Regulations for Honors Projects in Statistics

The following regulations are designed to facilitate the completion of suitable honors projects in statistics.

  1. Honors candidates will select an advisor and a topic before the end of the Junior year. A thesis proposal is required.
  2. As a statistics thesis, reproducible work is expected, as demonstrated via the sample thesis files below. The thesis must include a technical appendix so that all work in the thesis may be reproduced. Thesis submission must include an electronic version of the thesis and technical appendix, along with any necessary data or supplemental files.
  3. The body of the honors thesis, excluding front matter, appendices, and bibliography, is normally fifty pages in length.     In addition, the pages must be double-spaced, with no more than thirty lines per page.  The text must be printed using either a fixed width font of twelve or fewer letters per inch or a variable width font no smaller than 11 points.  Larger or smaller fonts are permitted outside regular text, such as in headings, sub- and superscripts, or footnotes.  On each page of the thesis, the margins should be 1.5 inches on the binding side and one inch for the remaining three sides.  The format described here is implemented in the thesis template file.     These regulations are in the interest of achieving a work whose appearance supports the content rather than obscures it.  The advantages of a document that is not only pleasing to the eye but also eminently readable are hard to overestimate.  Every effort should be made to format formulae, equations, programs, and technical expressions in such a way that they are clear and unambiguous.  An examination of recent theses and current journals, available in the Olds Library on the fifth floor of Seeley Mudd, will indicate the comparative advantages of doing a good job of formatting.   We strongly encourage thesis students to use the comprehensive evaluation and thesis template for their theses. Details on the template are available on github along with a user guide.
  4. Deadlines are announced each year by the Statistics Honors Advisor.
  5. Failure to comply with regulations 2, 3, and 4 above will be regarded as a serious flaw in the theses and may result in a lowered grade in the thesis course and possibly a lowered level of honors.
  6. Several copies of the thesis are required for submission, including an electronic pdf. Refer to the formal guidelines for formatting and submission on the Registrar's page.
  7.  Corrections to theses may be made after the date on which they are due in the Department's hands.  Corrections may be made to the body of the thesis, but every such correction will be acknowledged in a list under the heading "Corrections," along with the statement "When originally submitted, this honors thesis contained some errors which have been corrected in the current version.  Here is a list of the errors that were corrected."  This list will be given on a sheet or sheets to be appended to the thesis.  Corrections to spelling, grammar, or typography may be acknowledged by a general statement such as "30 spellings were corrected in various places in the thesis, and the notation for definite integral was changed in approximately 10 places." However, any correction that affects the meaning of a sentence or paragraph should be described in careful detail, and substantial additions to the thesis will not be allowed.  Questions about what should appear in the "Corrections" should be directed to the Chair.  Electronic versions of the thesis, technical appendix, and necessary data and supplemental files must all be updated at the time of correction as well.
  8. The honors candidate will make references pertaining to the thesis available to interested faculty upon request.  Such requests need to be honored promptly.
  9. Each candidate for honors will deliver a 30-40 minute long lecture in the departmental Colloquium on the subject of the thesis.  The talk should be intelligible to upper-level majors.  It need not cover all the material in the thesis, but the candidate should be prepared to answer questions from members of the Department on any aspect of the honors project, in a question period following the talk.
  10. The grade in the Senior Honors courses 498 and 499 is determined by the thesis advisor, possibly in consultation with the Department.  The level of honors recommended to the College is determined by the Department.  The talk as well as the thesis is considered when setting the level of honors.  The advisor decides whether the talk will be considered in determining the grade for the Senior Honors courses 498 and 499.
  11. Discuss copyright options with your thesis advisor and ask them to sign the copyright cover sheet, which is submitted with your thesis. The form and other thesis submission information is available at https://www.amherst.edu/academiclife/registrar/for-students/thesis_guide.

Last Edited: March 2023

Last major content edit: July 2014