Graduation Date vs. Date of Work on Coversheet

[Jason Skoog]

Hello,

We provide a template for our theses and dissertation projects. The template includes anticipated graduation month, and year at the bottom. There is no other date on the template.

Originally, this graduation month and year corresponded to when the project was submitted. But over time, some programs have had students complete projects half-way through their programs. Sometimes the students put the date they are submitted the project, rather than the graduation date. I'm not sure how to best handle this.

• I could emphasize the date is supposed to be the graduation date.
• I could change it to be the date that the paper is submitted.
• I could let programs decide either way.

In our metadata, we list the date of student graduation along with the date the paper was submitted. I look up their date of graduation in a database. I get the submission date from the process of them submitting the paper. I wonder if we need to include graduation date anymore. I've attached a copy of our template.

Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated. Thank you

Jason Skoog

Viterbo University, La Crosse, Wisconsin

608-796-3262