(This is a translation of the official version in Chinese 沪交研〔2021〕80 号. In case of any discrepancy, the Chinese version shall prevail.)

Chapter One: General Provisions

Article 1 To regulate the application and conferral of PhD degree and to ensure the quality of PhD degree, these regulations are hereby formulated in accordance with Regulations of the People’s Republic of China on Academic Degrees and Provisional Measures for the Implementation of the Regulations of the People’s Republic of China on Academic Degrees.

Article 2 All Chinese PhD students who support the leadership of the Communist Party of China, the socialist system, and abide by the Constitution and laws of China and SJTU rules and regulations, as well as international PhD students who abide by the Constitution and laws of China and SJTU rules and regulations, may apply for the conferral of a PhD degree in accordance with these regulations as long as they meet the basic requirements.

Chapter Two: Basic Requirements

Article 3 PhD students should complete their training program within the prescribed period of study and pass the examinations of the required ideological and political theory courses, basic theory courses, and specialized courses and obtain the required credits. They should also complete scientific research or practical training, successfully defend their dissertations, abide by the academic norms, and have the ability to conduct scientific research independently.

Article 4 Dissertations serve as the main basis for degree evaluation. The requirements of dissertations in terms of topic selection, overview, normalization and innovation of results shall conform to the relevant regulations of Schools and disciplines.

Article 5 PhD students are encouraged to carry out high-level, leading and original research regarding the country's real needs, cutting-edge science and cultural inheritance, and achieve innovative results. The innovativeness of scientific research achievements is a key measure of the quality of the dissertation.

Article 6 The innovative achievements for the PhD degree should be of first-class level and creativeness in the corresponding disciplines. The academic achievements can be presented in various forms such as papers published in high-ranking journals, conference papers, monographs, patents, works and research reports. The detailed requirements and recognition methods should refer to the standards of the corresponding School and discipline.

Chapter Three: Dissertation Pre-defense

Article 7 A pre-defense committee of five members shall be organized by the discipline. The committee member should hold an intermediate professional title or above. Those with intermediate titles (lecturers) shall be qualified to supervise doctoral students. And the number of lecturers and associate professors shall not exceed three. The pre-defense committee shall have one chairperson. The supervisors of the PhD students shall participate the dissertation pre-defense but shall not serve as member of the pre-defense committee.

Article 8 Before the pre-defense, the committee members shall conduct a detailed and comprehensive review of the draft dissertation, the dissertation proposal, the comments and suggestions from the experts for the dissertation proposal, annual evaluation of and suggestions for the dissertation, etc.

Article 9 The pre-defense shall follow these steps:

1) Introduction of the dissertation work: The PhD student shall demonstrate the innovations, key conclusions of the dissertation. The supervisor shall give a comprehensive introduction on the research work by the PhD student.

2) Questioning and evaluation: The pre-defense committee members shall question the draft dissertation, and comment critically on the originality, academic quality, basis of the theoretical and experimental research, research achievements, main conclusions, etc. The pre-defense committee shall reach a conclusion on the result of pre-defense, which should be one of qualified, qualified with conditions, and unqualified.

(1) Qualified: The dissertation can be submitted for review.

(2) Qualified with conditions: The dissertation shall be revised and then can be submitted for review after being approved by the supervisor and the School.

(3) Unqualified: The dissertation shall be revised comprehensively. After reviewed by the supervisor, the pre-defense should be re-organized.

Chapter Four: Dissertation Review

Article 10 Dissertation review shall be conducted either domestically or internationally 3 months before the dissertation defense. Students can apply for the dissertation defense once they pass the dissertation review.

Article 11 When dissertations are submitted for evaluation, they will be randomly checked by the University at the same time. Those picked will be checked in accordance with the SJTU Interim Regulations on Random Quality Checks of Dissertations.

Article 12 International review is encouraged for PhD dissertations. For details, please refer to Measures for International Review and Defense of PhD Dissertation.

Article 13 Three reviewers within the discipline of the dissertation work shall be invited to evaluate the dissertation. One of them shall be invited by the discipline, who should hold a title of associate professor or above (the associate professors shall hold a PhD degree), while the other two shall be invited by the University from outside, and their identities should be kept anonymous.

Article 14 The results of the dissertation review shall be returned within 2 months (from the date the paper is dispatched for review), in general. In case no response is received, after more than 2 months (excluding winter/summer vacations and statutory holidays), the PhD student may apply for the dissertation defense upon the consent of the supervisor. If the defense is passed, the student can apply for the doctoral degree. In case of any objections in the review results received after the oral defense, the author shall revise and improve the dissertation accordingly.

Article 15 If any module or the overall evaluation of the review results fails, the dissertation shall be regarded as contentious. The School shall organize a peer review of the dissertation within the University and submit the recommendations of the peer review to the Academic Degree Evaluation Committee of the School for review.

Article 16 Schools with mature and complete graduate education system are allowed to perform quality control of the dissertations by themselves. They should formulate their own dissertation evaluation KPIs and review procedure. The formulated evaluate scheme shall be submitted to the faculty for review and to the University for archive, and then put into practice. SJTU Degree Administration will conduct random checks on the dissertations that have not been reviewed by anonymous experts, evaluate their quality and dynamically adjust relevant policies.

Chapter Five: Dissertation Defense

Article 17 After the dissertation has been reviewed, revised and improved according to the comments/suggestions from the reviewers, and finalized after approval by the supervisor, the PhD students whose innovative achievements have met the standards of the School and the discipline may apply for the oral defense. He/she shall submit a defense application to the discipline, which should be approved by the supervisor, the discipline, and the School, then the defense could be organized. For international defense, please refer to Measures for International Review and Defense of PhD Dissertation. The dissertation defense should be completed within the year specified or approved by the University, and will not be accepted afterwards.

Article 18 The discipline shall designate a faculty member as the defense secretary, who will be responsible for the preparation of the defense materials, coordinating of the defense organization and the post-defense materials collection.

Article 19 The discipline shall invite 5 or 7 peer experts with intermediate professional titles or above (at least 2 experts should be from other universities/institutions) to for a dissertation defense committee. Experts with intermediate professional titles shall be qualified to supervise PhD students, and the total number of lecturers and associate professors shall not exceed 2. The chairperson of the defense committee must be assumed by a professor-level expert who has high academic level and rich PhD training experience. The supervisor of the PhD student can not serve as a member of the committee.

Article 20 The dissertation defense shall follow the principles of “upholding the standards, ensuring the quality, being just and reasonable”, support academic democracy, and proceed in an open manner (The defense for confidential dissertations shall be organized in a closed meeting) with the following steps:

1) The author presents the main content of the dissertation (around 45 minutes);

2) The author reads out Statement of Originality;

3) The defense secretary introduces the work of the dissertation, summary of the review results, comments/suggestions and conclusions of the anonymous review;

4) The defense committee members ask questions, and the author responds;

5) Adjourning. The defense committee holds an appraisal meeting to judge the academic level of the dissertation and the defense of the author, reach a defense conclusion by secret-ballot, draft and pass the defense resolution. The chairperson of the defense committee should sign on the defense resolution;

6) Resuming. The chairperson announces the resolution and conclusion of the defense committee;

7) The author of the dissertation signs the Copyright Authorization.

Article 21 The final conclusion of the dissertation defense shall be drawn from the secret ballot of the defense committee. If the number of affirmative votes exceeds 2/3 of the number of the committee members, the defense is seen as passed. The PhD student is recommended for the conferral of a doctoral degree, which shall be submitted to the Academic Degree Evaluation Committee of the School for approval.

Article 22 If the number of affirmative votes is less than 2/3 of the number of the committee members, the defense will be seen as failed. For those who fail the dissertation defense, he/she may revise the dissertation within two years (not exceeding the maximum allowed study duration) and then apply for dissertation review and defense. If the committee concludes that the dissertation does not reach the level of a doctoral dissertation, but reaches the level of a master degree thesis, and the applicant has not received a master's degree in the discipline, the committee may award the student a master's degree and report it to the Academic Degree Evaluation Committee.

Chapter Six: Degree Application and Review

Article 23 The degree applicant should submit the following documents within 30 days from the date they pass the defense (applications not submitted within the deadline or with incomplete materials will not be processed):

1). Dissertation (both the electronic and the print versions. In case of any suggestions of revision from the defense committee, the author must revise the dissertation accordingly and submit the final version.)

2). Degree Application Form (paper version)

3). Defense Resolution (paper version)

4). Dissertation Evaluation Form (paper version)

Article 24 Degree awarding is subject to three levels of review, namely, review of the Academic Degree Evaluation Committee of the School, faculty and University.

Article 25 The discipline and the Academic Degree Evaluation Committee of the School shall review the quality of the dissertation, the defense process and the academic publications of the degree applicant, and make a decision by secret ballot on whether or not to grant the doctoral degree. Applicants who received affirmative votes from more than half of the Academic Degree Evaluation Committee members of the School will be reported to the Academic Degree Evaluation Committee of the faculty for further review. The Academic Degree Evaluation Committee of the School shall also list around 10% of the applicants for critical review by the Academic Degree Evaluation Committee of the faculty. Applicants who received affirmative votes from less than half of the Academic Degree Evaluation Committee of the School shall be suspended from receiving a doctoral degree.

Article 26 The Academic Degree Evaluation Committee of the faculty shall review each PhD candidate that has been approved by the School Committee, and decide whether or not to grant a PhD degree by a secret ballot. Applicants who received affirmative votes from more than half of the Academic Degree Evaluation Committee members of the faculty will be reported to the Academic Degree Evaluation Committee of SJTU for final review. Those who fail to receive affirmative votes from more than half of the faculty committee members shall be suspended from receiving a doctoral degree.

Article 27 The Academic Degree Evaluation Committee of SJTU shall review the applications recommended by the Academic Degree Evaluation Committee of the faculty. Those approved by the SJTU committee shall be conferred a PhD degree and awarded a doctoral degree certificate. List of students to be conferred a PhD degree should be made public for 3 months (from the date the list is approved by the Academic Degree Evaluation Committee of the University).

Article 28 Students whose degree applications are suspended after reviews of the Academic Degree Evaluation Committees should revise the dissertation according to the comments/suggestions and requirements of the Committees and can re-apply for the degree within two years from the degree suspension date. Late applications will not be accepted.

Chapter Seven: Supplementary Provisions

Article 29 For degrees that have been granted, in case of serious violations of the regulations, such as fraudulent practices, after affirmation by the Academic Degree Evaluation Committee, the degree can be revoked. PhD students who have academic misconduct during their study or during the degree application process shall be dealt with according to the SJTU Academic Code of Conduct for Graduate Students.

Article 30 The Academic Degree Evaluation Committee of SJTU is the highest authority in the review of degree granting in Shanghai Jiao Tong University. For degree applicant who has objections over the decisions or resolutions made by the Academic Degree Evaluation Committees of the School and faculty, they may file a written appeal to the Academic Degree Evaluation Committee at a higher level within 10 working days upon receipt of the written notice. Appeals filed after the specified time will not be accepted.

Article 31 Regulations on the requirements for paper publications and dissertation defense for PhD students in the School of Medicine should refer to related documents of the School.

Article 32 For detailed information on the storage and archiving of materials for degree application and conferral, please refer to the list of archived documents for doctoral degree application and conferral (see Appendix I).

Article 33 These regulations are subject to interpretation by the Graduate School and take effect from September 1, 2021. In case of any discrepancy between this and previous version of the regulations, this version shall prevail.

Appendix: List of archived documents for doctoral degree application and conferral