Examinations

Examination Regulations

Examination regulations contain legally binding regulations on the timing, content and organization of each degree course, e.g. information on the course content to be completed (mandatory and mandatory elective modules) and on examinations (procedures, retakes, no-penalty attempts).

Depending on the chosen degree program, various sets of examination regulations are valid concurrently, for example the  General Examination Regulations (APO) (PDF, 572 kB), the  Regulations for Conducting Online Examinations (OPO) (PDF, 162 kB), degree program and subject-specific examination regulations, and module descriptions. In multi-subject degree courses, there are also interdisciplinary examination and internship regulations.

The regulations applicable to your chosen degree program are located in the degree program descriptions under  Degree Programs A-Z. Alternatively, you can also find the links to the regulations for your chosen subject/degree program on the degree information pages:

Final Theses

Registration

Before you can write your Bachelor's or Master's thesis, you must officially register for it.

• Before you register, you need to talk to the examiners about a topic and whether they will supervise your work. These are only preliminary discussions.
• Only after you have a fixed topic and a timetable do you have to register the thesis with the examinations office. You will then be admitted to the examination procedure. You may not write the thesis without registration and admission.
• You will receive written notification of your admission to the examination procedure from the examination committee. The notification will also indicate the deadline for completion.

Title and topic

You can only return your topic once and only in the first third of the processing period.

The title is normally identical to the topic. Minor changes to the title are possible if your first examiner agrees - be sure to discuss this with the examinations office.

Admission & Uni-Mail

You will receive official notification of admission to your thesis examination procedure by email to your university email address (@uos.de).

Important: Check your university e-mail regularly, as this is where all official notifications are sent.

Please note: If you are only provisionally enrolled in the Master's program, you cannot be admitted to the Master's thesis.

Extension of the processing time

If you need more time (e.g. due to illness), you must apply to the examinations office immediately and provide supporting documentation for the reasons. The examination commitee will decide on your application.

• In the case of illness, the completion period is usually extended by the certified duration of the illness.
• The completion period may be doubled at most. If you need longer, you will be given a new topic. Your first attempt is then deemed not to have been undertaken.
• Please note: In cases of illness-related inability to take an exam, the examination regulations require an medical certificate confirming that the health impairment has caused a reduction in the performance level of the examination candidate. Stating the specific illness is helpful but not decisive. A simple sick note (AU) is not sufficient. Here you can find a  Form for Assessing Candidates’ Inability to Take Examinations Due to Illness (PDF, 164 kB), which may be completed by a doctor.

Submission

You always hand in your work to the examinations office - never directly to the examiners.

• Submission: in the proper format and by the deadline set in the notification of admission.
• Pay attention to the opening hours of the examinations offices.
• If you send the paper to the examinations office by post, the postmark is decisive (i.e. the paper must be sent by the submission date at the latest!)
• The time of submission is documented.

Retakes

You may repeat a failed thesis once - in the same subject (in multi-subject degree programs). To do this, you must re-register within 12 months of being notified that you have failed. Otherwise, the thesis will be deemed to have been definitively failed.

Matriculation

Please note that you must be regularly enrolled for the registration and submission of your thesis as well as during the entire preparation period - even if you are repeating your thesis! However, you do not need to be enrolled for the subsequent correction phase. You should therefore pay attention to the  re-registration deadlines if your work extends beyond the end of the relevant semester. If you de-register immediately after submitting your thesis, you do so at your own risk.

If you are seeking to take an examination while you are on a leave of absence, please refer to the  regulations for examinations for students on leave of absence (PDF, 172 kB) (in German).

Assessment/correction time

• Two examiners will assess your work.
• Correction periods: usually 6 weeks (Bachelor), 8 weeks (Master).
• Even if you submit your thesis earlier, the examiners are only obliged to start correcting it after the official submission deadline and are entitled to make full use of the correction time. You should plan for this.
• If the two grades differ significantly (by two or more whole grades), you can request a third examiner. In this case, please contact your examinations office.

Declaration of Authorship and use of AI

At the end of your work, you confirm that you have written the thesis yourself (or, in the case of group work, the part marked accordingly) with a Declaration of Authorship. You must sign this page.

Your examiner will decide whether and for what purpose you are allowed to use AI tools (e.g. ChatGPT).

You can find the current template for the Declaration here:

Attempted Examination Infringements

All work is checked for plagiarism. Any attempts to violate examination regulations may result in the entire final examination being deemed to have been definitively failed.

Support services

Further information and support is available for students writing papers. It is worth taking a look at these pages:

 KI recommendations for action (in German)
 Writing advice / workshops
 Academic writing

Final Documents

Apply for graduation documents

• You can apply for your final documents digitally at HISinOne – Student Services.
• Important note: Please submit the  Form on Stays Abroad (PDF, 1.77 MB) together with your application and fill it out completely, even if you have not completed a stay abroad as part of your studies! This is for statistical purposes and is required for all students.
• You will receive the final documents by post.

If the final thesis is your last examination, you can have the examinations office confirm that you have completed your studies before the final documents are created - but only after the final thesis has been assessed (e.g. for job applications, traineeship).

Duplicates of final documents

A duplicate is a copy of the original and serves as a replacement. In certain justified cases, you can apply for a duplicate if

1. the original has been completely or partially destroyed
2. the original has been lost and there is reason to replace it or
3. in cases of certain name changes.

Please note that the creation of duplicates is subject to a corresponding  fee schedule (PDF, 82 kB) (in German). For your specific individual case, please contact the examinations office that was originally responsible for preparing your final documents.