Checking date: 21/03/2023


Course: 2024/2025

Bachelor Thesis (International Studies)
(16910)
Dual Bachelor in International Studies and Political Science (2018 Study Plan) (Plan: 411 - Estudio: 320)


Coordinating teacher: VILLAMIL FERNANDEZ, FRANCISCO

Department assigned to the subject: Social Sciences Department

Type: Bachelor Thesis
ECTS Credits: 6.0 ECTS

Course:
Semester:




Requirements (Subjects that are assumed to be known)
In order to apply for registering in the Bachelor Thesis, students must be registered in all remaining courses that they need to pass to complete their Bachelor studies. To submit and defend the Bachelor Thesis, students must have passed all required courses included in the Study Plan. As an exception, they can have only one course still to pass as a maximum.
Objectives
BASIC AND GENERAL COMPETENCES -Understand social, political, legal and economic realities from a comparative perspective - Know quantitative and qualitative research techniques and possess the ability to choose which is most adequate to apply in the field of Social Sciences - Be able to debate and formulate critical reasoning, using precise terminology and specialized resources, when analyzing international and global phenomena, employing both the concepts and knowledge from different disciplines as well as the methods of analysis, paradigms, and concepts pertaining to the Social Sciences - Be able to apply the scientific methods to the economic, social, and political questions of a global society; be able to formulate problems in this context, identify a possible explication or solution, and a method to contrast them by sensibly interpreting the data. - Be able to show that they possess and comprehend facts and contents in an area of study which, based on a previous general secondary school level, have been extended to those included in advanced textbooks and in some aspects proceed from the most advanced studies in this area. - Be able to show that they have learned how to apply their knowledge professionally to their future jobs or tasks and that they possess the competencies needed to develop and defend arguments and solve problems in that area of study. - Be able to show that they are capable of collecting and interpreting the relevant data (normally within their area of study) needed for formulating judgments that require critical thought on social, scientific, and ethical topics of relevance. - Be able to show that they are able to transmit information, ideas, problems, and solutions both to specialized and non-specialized publics - Be able to show that they have developed the learning skills required to perform further studies with a high degree of self-dependence OVERLAPPING COMPETENCES - Acquire the capacity to communicate knowledge in oral and written form, both to specialized and to nonspecialized publics. - Acquire the capacity to establish good interpersonal communication and to work both in interdisciplinary and international teams. - Acquire the capacity to organize and plan workloads, taking correct decisions based on the available information, collecting and interpreting relevant data in order to provide assessments in that area of study. - Develop the motivation and capacity to perform independent continuous learning for life, with an endowment to adapt to change and new situations. SPECIFIC COMPETENCIES - Be able stages of - Be able - Be able - Be able services. - Be able to policies in different countries. to discern the differentiating elements in international problems in accordance with the development of a country. to critically relate present and past events and processes. to formulate and solve basic economic, social, political problems in an international context. to design and evaluate programs to improve the management and quality of public and private to carry out case studies and apply comparative method to analyze institutions, processes and LEARNING OUTCOMES - Ability to analyze, from a multidisciplinary perspective, the principal aspects of international relations on different levels: aggregate (states, societies, and economies), individual, and collectives (organizations, firms, interest groups). - Capacity to recognize and contrast key facts, processes, and historical factors and to determine the relationships between the political, social, and economic aspects in the societies under study. - Capacity to elaborate with clear and well-reasoned arguments the connections between the different disciplines within established theoretical frameworks. - Capacity to determined, contrast and analyze the social, economic and political determinants of structures and developments in an international environment, and to reflect about
Skills and learning outcomes
Description of contents: programme
The objective of the Bachelor Thesis is to allow students to carry out a research project in International Studies. For that purpose, students will apply the scientific methodology learned during their Bachelor studies. In order to write a Thesis, students will first choose a topic of their interest, then they will identify a research problem that can be approached on the base of one or different questions. In the Thesis, students will offer answers based on a logical reasoning and using the analytical methods learned during their Bachelor studies. -Length: 8.000 (optimal)-10.000 words. A longer thesis must be approved. -Style: Times New Roman, size 12 -Margins: By default -Line Spacing: 1.5 -Graphs & Tables: Original, only included in the main text if necessary -Appendix: Tables, graphs, etc. providing supplementary information about the research. Do not include essential information here to save space. -References: Harvard citation style -Cover page: Containing Name, Last Name, Title of the Thesis, Advisor, Department, Topic in which the project is included or if it is a specific thesis, Degree -for which the project is for, date, and academic year. An official sample is also available at Biblioteca UC3M -File format: The thesis must be handed in through Aula Global and checked for plagiarism by Turnitin. Therefore, MSWord.docx or Adobe.pdf will be fine
Learning activities and methodology
All the activity will take place during the official dates of the semester in which the student is being enrolled in the course. Any further activity or assistance by the advisor will be on his/her own. Office hours: Individual or group sessions, so the advisor will employ 5 hours attending each student's needs. Individual research task. The student will develop the competences and skills acquired along the degree and will apply his/her knowledge into the task of developing a research project in the field of International Studies and, in case of a double degree, Economics, Politics, Business or Law areas, presenting as a result a written manuscript. Student load work: 150h. Advisor ¿s guidance and attendance: The advisor will attend and guide the student in the research process, making suggestions and comments that will help the student to understand, manage, and solve the challenges presented along the process. The office hours could take place either physically or by any remote platform, both would agree on.
Assessment System
70% of the final grade will be based on the manuscript handed in by the student and its public defense. An Evaluation committee formed by 2 members of the departments involved in the degree will assess the work and the competences acquired and demonstrated by the student according to an evaluation matrix publicly available since the beginning of the semester. The 30% left belongs to the Advisor's evaluation report, assessing the attendance and efforts demonstrated by the student throughout the semester. The University uses the Turnitin Feedback Studio program within the Aula Global for the delivery of student work. This program compares the originality of the work delivered by each student with millions of electronic resources and detects those parts of the text that are copied and pasted. If the student has correctly made the appointment and the bibliographic reference of the documents he uses as a source, Turnitin will not mark it as plagiarism.
Basic Bibliography
  • Bell, Judith. Cómo hacer tu primer trabajo de investigación. Gedisa. 2002.
  • Brandy, H. E. and Collier, D. (eds.). Rethinking Social Inquiry. Diverse Tools, Shared Standards.. Rowman&Littlefield Publishers . 2004.
  • Corbetta, P. . Social Research. Theory, Methods, and Techniques.. Sage. 2003.
  • García Picazo, P. . La investigación del medio internacional. . Tecnos. 2012.
  • King, G., Keohane, R. O., and Verba, S. . Designing Social Inquiry: Scientific Inference in Qualitative Research. Princeton University Press.. 1994.
Additional information

The course syllabus may change due academic events or other reasons.