The Bachelor’s thesis is the final thesis for the Bachelor's degree. The Bachelor’s thesis and related seminar are part of the compulsory intermediate studies of a student’s specialisation field. It requires students to apply their knowledge and skills to solve a research problem related to their field of study. The work requires an active and independent approach from students. The student bears the responsibility for the work, its progress and conclusion.

Students start the project by signing up for the thesis course or seminar according to their degree programme’s instructions. Degree programmes may issue their own, more detailed instructions to complement the university's guidelines and publish them in the eLUT student website or Moodle.

After completing the thesis, students will

• be familiar with the basic concepts and methods of scientific research
• be able to organise their own work and set their own goals and schedules
• be able to search for, critically evaluate, utilise and interpret sources
• define a research problem
• report on their research according to scientific practice and the practices of their own field.

The supervisor of the Bachelor’s thesis supports the student in independent work, scientific thinking and the development of research skills. The supervisor lets students present the progress of their work and gives feedback on it.

The supervisor is also the examiner who assesses the Bachelor’s thesis. The head of the degree programme may also appoint another teacher from the degree programme as the examiner. The examiner must have a Master’s degree.

The university expects students to know and observe the ethical principles of academic studies and therefore instructs students in following good scientific practice.

Plagiarism is strictly forbidden. Citations and references must be made in accordance with established scientific practice. If the degree programme or examiner require nothing else, the thesis should employ the author-date referencing style – also known as Harvard referencing. If regardless of the supervisor’s instruction the thesis contains plagiarised material, the thesis will receive a failing grade. Moreover, the matter will be brought to the rector's attention.

Supervisors employ the Turnitin software to verify the originality of the text, give feedback and guide the student. The university requires that final theses be checked with Turnitin before grading. Further information on Turnitin and originality verification is available Turnitin -page.

For additional information on the responsible conduct of research, see the LUT Code of Conduct.

Language

Students may write their Bachelor’s thesis in Finnish, Swedish or English. The section below regarding the abstract gives instructions on the language of the maturity test.

Content

The thesis typically includes the following parts in the following order:

• title page
• abstract
• table of contents
• list of symbols and abbreviations
• introduction
• discussion/processing
• summary
• conclusions
• references
• appendices.

The degree programmes or schools issue more detailed instructions on the formalities and writing of theses for their fields of study. However, all title pages and abstracts must be formulated as follows:

Title page

The title page contains the following information:

Lappeenranta - Lahti University of Technology LUT
Degree programme
Name of author
Title of thesis
Bachelor’s thesis and year
Supervisor 

On the title page, write the information above as follows (example): LUT School of Energy  Systems; NOT Name of school: LUT School of Energy Systems

Abstract/maturity test

Students include an abstract in their work. It is also the maturity test for the degree. The examiner of the thesis assesses the maturity test along with the entire thesis.

The abstract should start with the following information:

• type of document (abstract)
• title of thesis
• keywords
• name of author
• name of school (LUT Business School / LUT School of Energy Systems /LUT School of Engineering Sciences)
• degree programme
• supervisor of thesis.

The abstract is a public document.

Students who have received their compulsory education in Finland in either Finnish or Swedish write their maturity test in the language of their compulsory education. The examiner reviews the maturity test to verify the student’s knowledge of the field of study and the clarity of the language. The language will not be separately assessed by a language expert unless the thesis supervisor so requires for a special reason. The examiner gives the maturity test and its content (K1) and the language (K2) either a passing or a failing grade. In addition to the abstract in Finnish or Swedish, the degree programme may require an English abstract in the Bachelor's thesis.

Students who have received their compulsory education abroad or in a language other than Finnish or Swedish in Finland write an abstract in English as their maturity test. In such cases, the maturity test is given a passing or failing grade only in terms of the content (K1). Although examiners do not grade the language, the abstract must be clear and coherent.

More detailed instructions are available in the Maturity test -page.

Thesis template

A thesis template produced for LUT students guides in Bachelor’s thesis writing. Template is available in the beginning of this page.

The Bachelor's thesis is a public-access final thesis. Students publish their finished work by uploading it and its abstract(s) into the LUTPub database administrated by the LUT Academic Library. 

The Bachelor’s thesis is evaluated on the scale excellent (5), very good (4), good (3), satisfactory (2), passable (1) and failed (0). Students may not rewrite an approved Bachelor's thesis.

Schools define their own assessment criteria for Bachelor’s theses. The criteria may include e.g.

• the problem-setting, objectives, definitions and delimitations of the thesis
• the relationship to previous research
• the research approach, methods and material used in the work
• the schedule of the research and time management
• the results and their analysis
• the organisation and coherence of the work
• the profoundness of the work
• the reliability of the work
• the language and layout of the work
• an independent approach and application. 

Students dissatisfied with their grade may request a correction to the grade within 14 days of having received knowledge of it. The request is made in writing, addressed to the university's degree board and submitted to Records Services.

LUT Academic Library

• pages for students writing a thesis 
• LibGuides, a portal with instructions and information provided by the library  

Ethical guidelines for students

Turnitin guides

• for students
• for supervisors