Thesis status by department: Education and Human Development

Education and Human Development:

This department was definitely a pioneer at Brockport with ETDs. They have the model for best practices in terms of process here. All theses (and now capstones) are uploaded by the student. One of the required fields is the name of their Advisor. An email is sent to the advisor notifying them when the thesis is uploaded, with a link to review it. After they review the thesis, they have 3 choices. They can approve as submitted for posting, approve with a request for minor revisions, or reject it completely - which is never done. I receive a copy of the email, if it says approve for posting, I will post the thesis and update the site. If there is a request for minor revisions, the student can upload a revised copy and have it reviewed. In general, theses are not uploaded until they are at the end of the process, so most revisions will have been completed already. Sometimes when a thesis is initially uploaded, if I notice that the size of the file is unexpectedly large, I will look at it to see if I can determine what is going on. Sometimes it is in the wrong format, other times it is loaded with large illustrations. These are dealt with on a case-by-case basis.

As of 12/14/2016 - the EDH collection: http://digitalcommons.brockport.edu/ehd_theses/ has 684 theses and capstone projects, making it our largest collection, with 641,084 downloads to date. 

Updated as of 3/25/2019: 1,209 theses - 1,598,039 downloads - largest collection

An example of Digital Commons impact (Manila student uses info from EDH thesis)

I recently received this request from a student at the Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Maynila asking permission to use a questionnaire from a thesis:
From: Shaira Mae Martinez [mailto:smbm18r@yahoo.com]
Sent: Monday, August 17, 2015 12:00 PM
To: Myers, Kim
Subject: Request Letter for Questionnaire in Project‐ Based Learning and its Effect on Motivation In the Adolescent
Mathematics Classroom
Dear Sir/Madame,
Greetings from the people's university!
I am a senior student of Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Maynila and I'm currently taking up Bachelor of Secondary
Education major in Mathematics. I am writing an action research entitled “A Comparison between Audio‐visual aids and
Mathematical Activity as a Pedagogical Tool in Promoting Students' Learning” as a requirement for my subject Math71.
For this reason, I am asking in your good office a permission to use your questionnaires in the study which is entitled as
"Project‐ Based Learning and its Effect on Motivation In the Adolescent Mathematics Classroom" in my action research.
Rest assure that this will only be used for research purposes.
I’m hoping for your positive immediate response. Thank you and God Bless.
Sincerely,
Shaira Mae B. Martinez

I worked with the Education department, who was eventually able to tell me that she (Pamela Beres) was a teacher in the Kendall School District. A thorough search of their website revealed one email address, which gave me a clue to the protocol, and I sent the request off. Almost immediately I received an affirmative response, and was able to forward it on.