Science Mathematics and Statistics

Rules for Mathematics thesis and project courses

writing on a paper

For information on Honours theses please see Honours. Information about project courses within Postgraduate Coursework programs can be found at Postgraduate Coursework Project.

  • Project courses MATH3000, MATH3001, MATH3002 are restricted enrolment courses.
  • Normally the requirements for enrolment are:
    • Student has a Maths WAM exceeding 75;
    • Student has arranged a topic and supervisor;
    • Student can provide good reasons for doing a project instead of a coursework course;
    • Student receives the permission of the Head of School through the Director of Undergraduate Studies.

A project course should involve at least as much effort as an ordinary course of the same units of credit (which the University views as 25-30 hours per unit of credit). 

You should be aware that staff are not obliged to take on a student just because the student wants to run a project.

A staff member who agrees to take on a student must contact the Director of Undergraduate Studies or the Student Services Manager to arrange the student's formal enrolment.

Relation to other courses

A project course must not be on material covered at the same level by the student in any other course taken by the student (in Mathematics and Statistics or elsewhere) or as part of a paid Vacation Scholarship. It should also not be significantly the same material as any coursework course available to the student. 

Students considering undertaking a project course are strongly advised to read the University guidelines on plagiarism and acknowledging sources.

Assessment and submission

  • Your supervisor may ask you to prepare a report outline or a brief write-up of preliminary work by about Week 4 (1-2 pages).
  • The project must be completed by submitting a written report. The due date for a project run in semester is the Friday of the last teaching day of semester. For projects run over summer, the due date is the Friday before O Week. 
  • A 6 UOC project report should be about 20-35 pages (about half the length of an honours thesis). A 3 UOC project report should span 10-20 pages and a 12 UOC report around 40-60 pages. 
  • A talk may also be part of the project, and this needs to be taken into account when giving the mark.
  • In rare cases we may give a grade of SY (satisfactory) or FL (fail) for a project course instead of a mark out of 100.