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Synopsis exam 

An oral exam at master level may be based on a synopsis written by the student. The purpose of this exam form is to give the students the possibility of elaborating upon a specific subject within the larger subject matter of the course. The lecturer will provide the class with a collection of source material, expectations as to the content and form of the synopsis as well guidelines to the oral exam.

The synopsis may be prepared individually or in groups. It will be an individual oral exam regardless of whether you have written the synopsis on your own or as part of a group.

The synopsis must be a summary of the selected subject prepared by the individual student or the group. Contributions or quotations taken from works of others; i.e. books, articles or the like must be stated clearly in foot notes or by mentioning the sources in the synopsis. Lack of source references when using works of others may dismiss the student from the exam as it will be considered as cheating.

The oral exam must be initiated on the basis of the synopsis. The synopsis should influence the type and level of difficulty of the oral questions asked during the first part of the exam, but not necessarily the evaluation of the student’s performance. The exam must contain questions on matters not covered by the synopsis but by the required reading.

During the exam issues which are not covered in the course-required readings may be touched upon if they have been discussed on the basis of literature or material in the synopsis, and if they are relevant to the problem in question. Required reading materials and other materials may be brought along to the examination.

Oral examinations are open to the public. However, a student who has prepared a synopsis together with a fellow student (in a group) or who has written a synopsis on the same subject as another student, is only entitled to witness such other student’s exam after having been examined himself/herself.

Maximum size of the synopsis
A written synopsis must not exceed more than:

• One student writing the synopsis: A maximum of 11,700 number of characters (space bar not included)
• Two or more students writing the synopsis as a group: A maximum of 16,380 number of characters (space bar not included)

If you exceed the maximum number of characters listed above, the examiner may refuse to let you take the oral exam.

See instructions for character counting (pdf).

Handing in the synopsis

The synopsis should always be given directly to your teacher, who will give you further instructions on wheather it should be in paper form or by email.

You can not hand in your synopsis directely to the administration or the Student Counselling Centre.

Front page
Remember to use this front page when you hand in the synopsis: Synopsis - front page