ETD Policies and Procedures
General Inquiries
Contact your school administrator or ADAP with questions about graduation requirements and thesis or dissertation preparation, including formatting and paperwork requirements.
Use the Emory Theses and Dissertations Help form to contact library staff with questions about the electronic submission process and the ETD website.
Access
What's the difference between open and restricted access?
- Open Access: After the registrar processes your degree (generally 4-6 weeks after commencement), the full text of your work is publicly accessible through Emory’s Theses and Dissertations (ETD) website and through popular search engines such as Google.
- Restricted Access: After graduation, public access to your work is delayed for a time period you negotiate with your advisor and school or department. This delay is called an "embargo." You may choose to restrict access to your work for six months, one year, two years, or six years, depending on your agreement with your school or department.
For additional information, please see our Access Restrictions page.
Intellectual Property
All theses and dissertations produced at Emory are the intellectual property of the authors. Authors may disseminate those works as they see fit and also are solely responsible for the contents of their thesis or dissertation. Please refer to our Copyright and Patents page or contact the Libraries' Scholarly Communications Office at scholcomm@listserv.cc.emory.edu if you have questions about author's rights or the use of previously copyrighted materials.
Patentable Material
If your thesis or dissertation discloses or describes any inventions or discoveries that could potentially have commercial application and therefore warrant patenting, then you need to consult with the Office of Technology Transfer, your advisor, and ETD administrators before submitting your thesis or dissertation. You may contact the Office of Technology Transfer (OTT) at: (404) 727-2211.
Best Practices
It is important to take into consideration the accessibility and preservation of your files. Please review our Accessibility Best Practices for the ETD Repository document (PDF) for information on how to ensure that your record meets modern Accessibility standards and that your file types will archive well.
Paper Copies
The library no longer collects bound copies of theses and dissertations. The electronic copy will be the university's official copy of your work. Please contact your graduate program for information on their requirements on paper copies.
Authors interested in having bound copies of their thesis or dissertation produced for themselves, their committee members, or their department/program libraries can consult the vendors below.
Vendors:
Although we have examined the work of the vendors listed on this page, we cannot endorse any particular entity. This is not intended to be a comprehensive list. We encourage authors to explore a variety of vendors in order to obtain copies of their theses and dissertations at a price and quality that meets their satisfaction.
ProQuest
All doctoral dissertations will be sent to ProQuest where they are made available under the terms set in their submission agreement. (See Laney Graduate School website for necessary forms.) Master's theses may be sent to ProQuest at the discretion of the author. Please be aware that most students should choose the traditional publishing option for ProQuest. ProQuest offers an "open access" option which gives you an opportunity to place your work in their open access repository. However, you already have the option to make your work openly accessible in the Emory ETD repository at no cost to you. (Students may select ProQuest's open access publishing option; however, they will be required to pay an additional fee.)
Access Restrictions
ProQuest does not offer an access restriction period of greater than 2 years. If you choose a 6-year embargo, it is your responsibility to inform ProQuest of your embargo term. Contact them directly at disspub@proquest.com.
If you want to restrict access to your abstract, you must contact ProQuest directly at disspub@proquest.com soon after graduation to request they not include your abstract in Dissertations Abstract. Provide your name, dissertation title, school (Emory University), and, if possible, the publication number (not necessary but makes things easier). If you need to speak with someone at ProQuest, the appropriate department can be reached at 734-761-4700, x2.