For PhD candidates at ITS

For new PhD candidates at ITS

Before employment date

Important issues when relocating to Norway (for foreign PhD candidates only)

Familiarize yourself with the practical information found in this document:

• Information for foreign employees coming to ITS

Main points:

• Visa: Contact your local authorities to see if you will need a visa in order to travel and work in Norway.
• Prior to arrival in Norway, and as soon as you know your employment date or arrival in Norway, you must book an appointment with the Service Center for Foreign Workers . You should visit the center quite soon after you arrive.
• Housing (see document above)
• Bank account (see document above)
• For further information or assistance see document above

Important info for all new PhD candidates

Familiarize yourself with the practical information found in these documents:

• New employee at ITS
• New PhD candidate at ITS

Note specifically:

• Around three weeks before the employment date: The PhD candidate sends email to IT admin at ITS, Arild Hemstad, to initiate the purchase of a laptop for the PhD candidate, to be ready before the employment date.

Your first day at ITS

• Meeting at the Office building: The Department is located at Gunnar Randers vei 19, 2007 Kjeller
• Meeting with the PhD coordinator, Yvonne Baade:
  • Administrative tour together with the PhD coordinator:
    • Get laptop, activate login credentials, get temporary guest ID entrance card etc. at IT support (Arild Hemstad):
    • Physical key to office (Tuhta Ismailova)
    • Confirmation of employment by head of adm. (Marit Tronstad)
  • The PhD coordinator will book a short introductory meeting for you with the candidate's personal leader (Cecilie Rolstad Denby)

  • The PhD coordinator will also have a short introductory talk with you related to your stay at ITS as a PhD candidate

• Meeting with the PhD representative (Sebastian Zieglmeier):

  • Tour in the building together with the PhD representative:

    • See the facilites

    • Meet and greet with colleages

• Meeting with supervisor / supervisor team:

  • "PhD Expectations Dialogue"

    • Either on the first day, or an appointment is set for the coming days

  • Getting your office space

After the employment date

The first week after employment

• "PhD Expectations Dialogue": A meeting between PhD candidate and main supervisor or supervisor team. The discussion should bring answers to the questions listed in this form (pdf). You can download the MS Word version here (docx). Deadline: 1 week after employment date. For preparation, you might look at:
  • General info about the PhD programme at the faculty
  • Supervision and the role of the supervisors
• "Employee ID Card": Get your entrance key card at the SiO Customer Service in the Kristian Ottosen Building at the main campus at Blindern in Oslo.
• Start early working with the application for enrollment into the PhD programme, because the application requires considerable work effort.
• Start also early signing up to courses, if relevant

Application to be enrolled in the PhD programme (Deadline: 2 months after employment date)

• Application form and guide (English)
• MS Word template for project descriptions at ITS. However, you are encouraged to use Latex instead, to prepare youself for later paper writing.
• If you prefer to present your progress timeline with a Gantt chart instead of the traditional table shown in the Word-template, you might create the Gantt it in an Excel file. Here is an example (xlsx)
• Simple Latex template for project descriptions at ITS. You might want to copy this template file into Overleaf.
• Example of up-to-date project description using Latex
• Example of an old project description (using an outdated template, and without coursework, progress plan, etc.)

Courses to consider in Education Component of PhD

• Here are the general overarching rules of the faculty: Courses and the educational component of your PhD  , while §8.1.1 The educational component’s scope, composition, and content provides further details. 
• PhD candidates can attend UiO's "NorRen" summer school, which gives 5 ECTS of credits. (No additional application to ITS is required to obtain 5 ECTS for using this summer school as your special PhD syllabus.)
• In addition, ITS has supplementary and more specific department rules for the educational component applying to PhD candidates at ITS:
  • Summer schools are special types of research courses that can count 2-3 ECTS at ITS:
    • Summer schools previously accepted for PhD candidates at ITS
    • You need to appy to ITS to get acceptance for using summer schools (except "NorRen") as part of your special PhD syllabus, using this form: Application for allowing Summer School to count as special syllabus at ITS
  • ITS is in the middle of a trial-period where the department allows the Norwegian course at UiO (which includes a final exam) to count for 3 ECTS:
    • Norwegian courses for PhD candidates (recommended for foreign PhD candidates)
  • ITS has traditionally been restrictive on Literature Review as special syllabus, but it is not ruled out:
    • Application for allowing Literature Review to count as special syllabus at ITS
• Mandatory ethics course for PhD candidates (Should be taken in first semester or as early as possible)
• PhD courses at Department of Technology Systems (ITS)
• You might also take PhD courses at other departments, e.g.:
  • PhD courses at Department of Informatics (IFI)
  • PhD courses at Department of Physics (FI)
• Those interested in enhancing their teaching skills, can take the MNPED9000 – Teaching in STEM of 5 ECTS. The course requires that the PhD candidate is teaching, because the learning in the course must be applied in a real teaching scenario. PhD candidates without mandatory teaching duties, might try to "borrow" some lectures at ITS to be able to follow this course.

Important deadlines

• Foreign PhD candidates only: Visa, appointment with the Service Center for Foreign Workers at http://www.sua.no/en/, housing, etc., must be in place before employment. More info above.
• All: 3 weeks before employment date: PhD candidate contacts IT admin at ITS, Arild Hemstad, to initiate purchase of laptop and office equipment. Supervisor needs to be in the loop.
• 1 week after employment date: PhD candidate sends email to PhD coordinator at ITS that the "Expectation Dialogue" has been completed.
• 2 months after employment date: Send application to be enrolled in the PhD Programme

Working as a PhD candidate

3rd Semester (Mid-term) Evaluation

• Guidelines for 3rd semester evaluations at ITS
• Form to be filled out during the 3rd semester evalution

Making formal changes to your ongoing PhD project

• Application for making changes to the agreed educational component (pdf)
• Application for making changes to the supervisor team (pdf) 
• Application for extension of the PhD admission period (pdf)
• Extension of employment period for research fellows (Norwegian - English)

Other useful info

Useful resources for PhD candidates

• PhD on Track
• Events for PhD candidates at UiO
• Courses for students, staff and PhD students
• PhD committee at ITS

Research ethics

• Overview of resources, routines and tools for research ethics at UiO (link)
• Use of sources and citations
• Cheating

Finishing your PhD

• Information page at Matnat (English - Norwegian)
• Application to have the thesis assessed
• Documentation of completed and passed educational component
• Co-author declaration
• Adjudication committee proposal
• Declaration for members of the adjudication committee
• Doctoral Conferment (English - Norwegian)