Guidance on the Nomination of Examiners
Internal Examiners
The following people can be nominated as Internal Examiners, providing they are research active and have previous graduate supervision experience:
- University Teaching Officers;
- College Teaching Officers;
- Senior Research Associates;
- Retirees on a Voluntary University Contract;
- Employees of a University Partner Institute.
Persons registered as undergraduate or graduate students at this or any other institution may not be nominated as Examiners.
Conflicts of Interest
- The examiner should not normally have co-held grants with, or recently or extensively published with, the candidate or the candidate’s supervisor.
- Co-held grants involving very large consortia are not normally considered conflicts of interest and other cases may be permitted following consideration by the Degree Committee if extenuating grounds exist.
- The examiner should not be a previous PhD student of the candidate’s supervisor, unless 10 years or more have elapsed since completion.
External Examiners
- Those appointed should normally be persons of seniority and must have appropriate experience and/or knowledge and the ability to command respect in the subject. In certain circumstances, it is appropriate that persons with suitable experience from outside the higher education system, eg, from industry or the professions, be invited to act.
- The appointment of non-EEA external examiners should be exceptional and a case for permission to so appoint must be made in advance to the Board of Graduate Studies, via the Degree Committee. If a non-EEA external examiner is appointed, with permission from the Board of Graduate Studies, the Board will only pay the return economy airfare and the Examiner’s fee. The department is expected to cover all other travel, accommodation and subsistence costs.
- If not currently working in the UK, the appointee must have previously examined a PhD in the UK or be fully conversant with the UK PhD system.
Conflicts of Interest
The External Examiner must provide an independent and critical view of the examination, by avoiding potential conflicts of interest (either professional or personal). To this end, the proposed External Examiner:
- must not hold an office in the University, or a Fellowship or some office or post in a College;
- must not be a former member of staff of the University, unless more than five years have passed since their departure;
- The examiner should not normally have co-held grants with, or recently or extensively published with, the candidate or the candidate’s supervisor.
Co-held grants involving very large consortia are not normally considered conflicts of interest and other cases may be permitted following consideration by the Degree Committee if extenuating grounds exist.
- The examiner should not be a previous PhD student of the candidate’s supervisor, unless 10 years or more have elapsed since completion.