The Thesis Advisory Committee (TAC) should preferably be formed within 2 months after the students have passed the PhD Qualifying Examination for MSc candidates or 2 months after their enrolment for the Direct PhD program for PhD candidates.

Thesis Advisor will nominate Members of this Committee. Thesis Committee Members need not be restricted only to staff members of NUS Medicine. Staff members and investigators from National Research Institutes/Centres and other faculties within NUS may be included.

Composition of TAC

Thesis Advisor + 2 Members
At most, one Co-Thesis Advisor can be a member of the TAC. The other must not be involved with supervision of the student.

If Thesis Advisor wishes to nominate a member from overseas, the TAC will require 4 members (comprising 3 local-based and 1 overseas).

Roles of TAC

This Committee is responsible for monitoring the student’s progress. The Thesis Advisor and Co-Thesis Advisor (s) will continue to be responsible for completing the 6-monthly progress report during the university’s Research Progress Report exercise.

  • The TAC members will select a Chairman among themselves. The Chairman should not be the Thesis Advisor or Co-Thesis Advisor. It is the responsibility of the Chairman to chair all meetings of the TAC.
  • The Thesis Advisor is responsible for calling the meetings of the TAC with the Student. The outcome of these meetings may be incorporated into the student’s 6-monthly progress reports. At least 2 of the TAC Members must be present at each meeting with the student.
  • Before the meeting, the Student will submit a report. The first report should have an introduction with the aims of the project, proposed methodology and any preliminary results that are available. Subsequent reports should include a summary of results obtained and any new results since the last report with a discussion on the significance of the new results. If there are no significant results, the TAC can require the Student to give an oral presentation of the work done over the past 6/12 months and discuss future plans. These presentations can be specially arranged or can be a regular departmental/research group seminar at which the TAC is present.
  • At the end of the meeting, the TAC will make recommendations for further work where appropriate.
  • If the work done is deemed sufficient for a thesis, it is the responsibility of the Thesis Advisor to ensure that the thesis is written up satisfactorily.

The Thesis Advisor will still be responsible for ensuring that the candidate is eligible for upgrading before putting the candidate up for the PhD Qualifying Examination. At most one member of the TAC can be in the PhD Qualifying Examination Committee.

TAC Report Submission

The TAC will keep its own report and a copy is to be submitted to the Division of Graduate Studies. The TAC Report Form can be downloaded from https://myportal.nus.edu.sg/studentportal/med/gr/forms_SOM.html (log-in is required).
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