Exams & Theses

The bachelor thesis must be applied for in due time. The application should include the title and a brief description of the project. Each bachelor thesis has two supervisors. At least one of the supervisors must be a professor of the design department. The first supervisor can be freely chosen by the students. A confirmation of supervision must be obtained in the application. The first supervisor must be a professor at the University of Applied Sciences Potsdam. They can propose a second supervisor – but have no right to be supervised by the named person. Depending on the examination load, the examination board organises the distribution of the second supervisors. You will be informed of the second supervisor with the confirmation of your bachelor admission. You can arrange consultation appointments with the first and second supervisors during the processing period.

At the end of the processing period, you can apply for the Master's programme. The master's entrance examination is separate from the Bachelor's examinations, but takes place in the same week.

The bachelor's thesis is an independently conducted project. It consists of two units – the work show and the bachelor thesis. The textual length of the BA thesis should be approx. 40,000 characters.

The Werkschau and the BA thesis can be documented in two different books. However, they are both part of the BA thesis and must be submitted together by the deadline (for deadline, see admission notice). The BA thesis is completed when it is handed in. The remaining time until the examination can be used to develop the presentation and make prototypes, models or dummies.

The show of work should make up approx. 20 % of the scope of the BA thesis. In this part, a selection of works produced at the FHP so far should be presented. A special focus should be on the work from the internship (if possible) and the project studies. The work should be documented visually and textually, with an emphasis on visual documentation. If there is a close relationship between the previous projects and the BA thesis, this can be presented here. In contrast to the thesis, the Werkschau is created entirely on one's own responsibility and is not supervised.

The bachelor's thesis should be approx. 80 % of the scope of the BA thesis.

Question
What is the topic of the paper? What design problems are being addressed? In what context is the research being carried out?

Research
What are the most important reference projects for the work? Which scientific or cultural references are relevant to the paper? Which target groups is the project aimed at?

Presentation
Design maxims; Which design means, methods or guidelines should be used? What focal points are to be set? Which findings or goals are to be achieved with the project?

Development of design solutions
How can the project be concretised in the design? What does it look like? How were which design maxims implemented?

A note on the scope of the Bachelor's thesis:
Design projects from the modules 21FV-Fachvertiefung can serve as orientation. The design projects of the BA thesis correspond in scope and depth to the results of the specialisation theses.

The concepts and designs developed in the BA thesis can be used as the basis for the proposal of the master's application. You can therefore apply for the master's programme with an extended bachelor's topic.

The documentation of the bachelor thesis is to be submitted in analogue or digital form in triplicate to the examination board by the deadline.

The digital documentation should be in the form of Incom project documentation. This should be public by default, but can be made accessible only to the supervisors if required. Incom offers a corresponding function.
A printout of the Incom project is accepted as proof of the digital documentation.

The minimum requirements for digital documentation are as follows:

• Project title
• Author(s)
• Short description
• Detailed description
• Thumbnail
• Project images (1-10)
• Supervisors
• Period of creation
• Cooperation partners (optional)
• Links
• Thesis as compressed PDF

Note: It is recommended to create the Incom project documentation right at the beginning of the editing period and initially set it to "invisible". However, the URL of the project can then already be included in the analogue documentation.

The presentation of the BA thesis includes both the work show and the BA thesis. The presentation of the two parts may not exceed 30 minutes. In the case of group work, the presentation time will be adjusted accordingly in consultation with the examiners.

The presentation usually takes place at the University of Applied Sciences Potsdam. Only in justified exceptional cases can it also take place outside of the university.

• approx. 10 min. work show
• approx. 20 min. BA thesis
• approx. 10 min. discussion and colloquium

The presentation of the work show and BA thesis can be presented in one continuous presentation. In the work show, you should present your person, your understanding of design and your design attitude using examples of your work from your main and project studies.

After presenting yourself in the work show, the BA thesis is then presented. Here, the focus should be on the presentation of the designs as well as their conceptual and theoretical reflection.

The examination is open to the public. External guests (including family members) may only take part in the examinations with the express prior permission of the examiners and the chairperson of the examination committee.

The relationship between theory and design may vary depending on the orientation of the work.

Abstract

Brief summary of the problem statement and objectives as well as the results of the work.

Problem statement/question and aim

What is the topic of the thesis? Which design-related or disciplinary problem is addressed? What is the design question or objective guiding the work? What new insights or new design solutions does the work of the problem lead to?

Theory and research

What is the disciplinary state of development and knowledge or what are the most important reference projects and theories of the paper? In which academic discourses is the MA thesis situated? Which scientific, social or creative references are relevant to the work? Which target groups is the project aimed at?

Modelling

What insights are to be gained and what goals are to be achieved with the project? How will the problem and the goal of the project be pursued and which sub-steps will be completed in which sections? How can the hypotheses or theoretical findings be transferred into concrete designs and justified? Which creative means, analytical or empirical methods or guidelines appropriate to the problem should be applied, why and how?

Design

Extensive and detailed drafts should be prepared on the basis of the modelling. The drafts represent the main part of the independent design paper. In the case of scientific-theoretical Master's theses, the focus is on the critical reflection of the problem and the design propositions derived from it. Both should achieve a formal-aesthetic quality as well as address the problem and the objective.

Critical reflection of the design

Does the design systematically work towards answering the previously formulated problem? Does the formulation and argumentation as well as the design clearly show an independent examination of the topic? Is there a critical examination of the topic? Are own connections made or disciplinary relevant approaches developed?

Outlook

Are the questions and results summarised again in relation to each other? Are possible consequences and implementation possibilities of the results described and discussed? How can the project and the designs be further developed? What design, economic or scientific perspectives arise?

The documentation of the master's thesis must be submitted in analogue and digital form in triplicate to the Examinations Office by the deadline. The digital documentation should be in the form of Incom project documentation. This should be public by default, but can be made accessible only to the supervisors if required. Incom offers a corresponding function. A printout of the Incom project is accepted as proof of the digital documentation.

Note: It is recommended to create the Incom project documentation right at the beginning of the editing period and to set it to "invisible" at first. However, the URL of the project can then already be included in the analogue documentation.

The presentation of the master's thesis should not exceed 30 minutes. The presentation is followed by approx. 15 minutes of discussion and colloquium. The examination is open to the public. External guests (including family members) may only take part in the examinations with the express prior permission of the examiners and the chairperson of the examination committee.