Departments' thesis binding policies vary

The Wilson School concentrator has done more than 200 hours of work for his thesis on energy policy, a topic he began writing on in high school. But even when the finished product is in his hands fresh off the printer, his work is not over. Now, he must bind it — and foot the bill.

For some seniors, this final step is insignificant, but for Coan and his fellow Wilson School majors, turning in an unbound thesis can result in a deduction of one-third of a letter grade. The school’s expensive binding policies contrast with those of some other departments.

The history and psychology departments do not require theses to be bound prior to submission, but other departments, such as politics and the Wilson School, require not one, but two bound copies. Furthermore, according to the Wilson School’s senior thesis manual, “Under no circumstances will extensions be granted for any reason connected with … binding problems.”

Even when everything is finished on time, though, binding can be expensive.

“A traditional gold-stamped, jet-black ink thesis will run you $50,” Pequod Printing manager Chris Kraft said. He noted that opting for soft binding lowers that cost to only $15, but the Wilson School requires “hard bound” copies, according to the department’s senior thesis manual.

“I would’ve assumed that students in all departments have to pay. It seems that the costs should be the same for everyone,” Wilson School concentrator Adrienne Clermont ’09 said, adding that between the $50 per cover and 17 cents per page required for the school’s specified paper type, she expected to spend in excess of $150 binding her thesis.

“In a school where we pay $500 for books, this is something that I don’t think students should really have to deal with,” Clermont added. “But, you know, I’m lucky that $150 is not a huge burden for me.”

When asked whether the Wilson School provides financial aid to cover the binding costs for seniors, an administrator, who wished to remain anonymous, simply said, “No.”

“A potential problem does arise if some students cannot afford the $100 for two bound copies,” Coan said in an e-mail.

The financial burden placed by requiring two bound theses may make departments’ practices unequal, psychology major Juan Contreras ’09 said.

“I’m not sure if [binding theses] would be prohibitive in terms of cost,” he said, “but for some students, it’s more difficult to afford binding than others, so it’s a little bit unfair.”

Unlike the Wilson School, Contreras’ department handles the binding at no charge. The psychology department also only requires one electronic copy of seniors’ theses submitted via Blackboard and one physical unbound copy delivered to the department. Contreras added that the University should work toward standardizing its thesis policies “across the board” to mirror the psychology department’s.

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To others in the psychology department, even this single, unbound copy seems superfluous.

“I don’t really understand why we have to hand in a paper copy at all,” psychology major Julianna Stevens ’09 said. “I think it’s just a waste of paper because I think most professors probably just read [theses] on their computers anyway.”

Psychology major Jacqui Rabkin ’09 noted in an e-mail that “students already have enough on their plates” without worrying about thesis binding.

“I personally get a lot of enjoyment out of deleting all the thesis-binding Pequod e-mails,” Rabkin said. “One less thing to worry about!”

Etta Recke, the undergraduate program administrator in the history department, noted that any decision to standardize a particular submission method would ultimately rest with the faculty.

“They’re the ones reading [the theses],” she said, adding that strictly electronic submission “makes sense” because faculty are not allowed to write comments on the physical copies of the thesis anyway. The history department requires seniors to turn in two printed copies: One is placed in a binder provided by the department, and the second can be either bound or unbound.

“It would certainly seem more fair to me to have a more uniform policy,” Clermont said.