WHAT IS AN ETD?

An ETD is a document that explains the research or scholarship of a graduate student in an electronic format. It is simultaneously suitable for machine archives and worldwide retrieval. The ETD is similar to its paper predecessor. For example, it has figures, tables, footnotes, and references. It also has a title page with the author's name, the official name of the university, the degree sought, and the names of the committee members. Furthermore, it may describe why the work was done, how the research relates to previous work as recorded in the literature, the research methods used, the results, and the interpretation and discussion of the results, and a summary with conclusions.

The ETD is different from its paper predecessor, however, in a few important aspects. First, it provides a technologically advanced medium for expressing your ideas. You may prepare an ETD by using nearly any word processor or document preparation system, and by incorporating relevant multimedia objects. Second, it is less expensive for you to prepare. By creating an ETD, you avoid the requirement of submitting multiple copies on special paper. Third, ETDs promote greater access to your research. ETDs are made available to anyone that browses the World Wide Web. They consume virtually no library shelf space, and never collect dust.

Overall, ETDs contribute to worldwide graduate education and unlock the underutilized results of graduate research for the scholarly community.