UT Arlington takes an unusual position for a large public research university: it says outright that there is no one-size-fits-all format for a thesis or dissertation. You are expected to follow the standards of your own field and the guidance of your supervising committee.
That sounds liberating until you realise it shifts the work onto you. There is still a short list of requirements that are not up for discussion, and getting those wrong is what causes documents to bounce back.
The rules that are actually fixed
Whatever style guide your discipline uses, these apply to every thesis and dissertation submitted at UTA.
| Requirement | Rule |
|---|---|
| Page size | 8½ x 11 inches (US letter) |
| Margins | Minimum 1 inch, identical throughout |
| Font | Any 10 or 12 point, not italic, ornamental or script |
| Preferred fonts | Times New Roman or Arial |
| Smallest legible size | 7 point, and only in notes, captions, large tables and appendices |
| Line spacing | Double, with named exceptions |
| Page numbers | Start at page one of the body, same position on every page |
Two of these catch people out more than the rest.
Margins apply to your figures too. Charts, maps and tables must fit inside the margins. They must not extend past the left, right, top or bottom. A wide results table that looks fine on screen is one of the most common reasons a document comes back.
Page number placement is a single decision, made once. Top right, bottom right or bottom centre; pick one and use it on every numbered page. The number must sit alone, with no text or other symbols beside it. Landscape pages are the trap here: the number has to appear in the same physical location as it does on portrait pages, which means rotating it rather than letting your word processor put it wherever it likes.
Where you may single space
The text is double spaced. The manual then lists the exceptions, and the important part is the condition attached to them.
- Block quotations
- Lists in text
- Table and figure titles, where single spacing is actually recommended so they read as distinct from the body
- Footnotes and endnotes, with a single space separating each one
- The reference section, which may match the body or be single spaced
- Appendices, where spacing may vary by the nature of the material and may even differ between appendices
Whichever way you decide, the decision must be followed every time that case recurs. Consistency is the rule being enforced, not the spacing itself.
Front matter, in this order
The elements must appear in the order below. Optional means you may leave it out entirely; if you do, close the gap rather than leaving a blank page.
- Title page (required, not numbered)
- Abstract (required, double spaced, normally numbered roman ii)
- Copyright page (optional)
- Acknowledgments (optional)
- Dedication (optional)
- Table of contents (required)
- Lists of tables, figures, abbreviations (optional, each starting a new page)
- Body, numbered consecutively to the end with no skipped pages
- Bibliography or references (required, unless you provide references at the end of every chapter)
- Appendix (optional)
The title page date
This is small and genuinely easy to get wrong:
The date must be the month and year in which you will graduate, and the only permitted months are May, August or December.
So a thesis finished in March carries a May date. If you put your submission month on the title page you will be asked to change it.
Monograph or article-based
UTA accepts both, and the difference is more than presentational.
A monograph is the classic form: related chapters, typically a substantial literature review establishing a problem that later chapters analyse, then a closing chapter on broader meaning. Monographs must follow the university-defined format throughout.
An article-based thesis collects manuscripts that are in preparation, in press or already published. Its advantage is formatting: manuscripts may keep the format of their intended publisher, and those formats can be preserved even where they differ between chapters. Its burden is coherence.
The document must not be a collection of unrelated manuscripts. An introductory chapter identifies the common theme, and a concluding chapter revisits that theme in light of what the manuscripts found.
Choosing monograph style is left to your degree-granting unit and supervising committee, so this is a conversation to have early rather than a preference you exercise late. If your work involves co-authored manuscripts, the Graduate School's Multiple Author Release form becomes relevant.
Submission runs through the Library, not the Graduate School
This surprises people. The sequence is:
- Your supervising committee tells the Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Coordinator at the Library that the document meets academic requirements and disciplinary format expectations.
- You email [email protected] with your name, department and degree to start the process.
- You submit to MavMatrix, the institutional repository, through your departmental collection.
- The ETD Coordinator verifies the Intellectual Property Statement has been signed.
Step four has teeth. If that statement has not been signed and provided, the thesis does not satisfy graduation requirements, regardless of how the academic work was judged.
Submission deadlines
| Semester | Deadline |
|---|---|
| Spring 2026 | 11 May 2026 |
| Summer 2026 | 11 August 2026 |
| Fall 2026 | 14 December 2026 |
Check these against the Library's current submission page before you plan around them, since they move each year.
Copyright and embargoes
You retain copyright as the author. The release you sign is non-exclusive, which means you may publish the work elsewhere without seeking UTA's permission. That matters if chapters are heading for journals.
If you need the full text held back, there are three options:
| Embargo | Effect |
|---|---|
| 6 months | Restricted from worldwide internet access for six months |
| 12 months | Held for twelve months from the semester and year of graduation |
| 24 months | The maximum, absent extenuating legal circumstances |
An embargoed thesis is not invisible. Title, author, date and abstract remain public; only the full text is restricted. Raise an embargo while you are negotiating access to industry data or planning journal submission, not on the day you upload.
One contradiction worth knowing about
The Graduate School's monograph manual recommends using the UTA thesis and dissertation electronic template, and points at the library for it. The Libraries' current submission page says the opposite: that they do not have any official templates, because each discipline has different requirements, and that you should contact your department and consult the Graduate School's guidelines instead.
Both pages are live. The practical reading is that the template is no longer something to count on, so ask your department what it actually expects before spending a day looking for a file that may not be maintained.
What UT Arlington does not specify
Being clear about the gaps is more useful than inventing figures to fill them. From the published manuals and submission pages, the following are not set centrally:
- No minimum or maximum word count or page count, for any degree level
- No prescribed citation style; the manuals list APA, MLA, Turabian, ACS, Chicago and CBE as examples and leave the choice to your committee
- No university-wide rule on generative AI use in theses
- No centrally published committee size or composition requirements
- No centrally published similarity or plagiarism-check threshold
The absence of a published rule is not the same as permission, particularly on AI use. Ask your supervisor, and get the answer in writing if the stakes are high.
Pre-submission checklist
- Margins at least 1 inch and identical on every page, figures and tables included
- One font, 10 or 12 point, not italic, ornamental or script
- Double spaced, with each single-spacing exception applied consistently
- Page numbers start at body page one, same position throughout, landscape pages included
- Title page dated May, August or December of your graduation, and unnumbered
- Abstract double spaced
- Front matter in the prescribed order, with omitted optional sections removed entirely
- All fonts and symbols embedded in the PDF
- Multiple Author Release filed if any chapter is co-authored
- Intellectual Property Statement signed
- Embargo decided before upload, not after
- Committee has notified the ETD Coordinator
Where to get help
Format and electronic submission questions go to [email protected]. The Graduate School team is on [email protected], and accessibility questions on [email protected]. Your supervising committee owns everything the manuals leave open, which at UTA is most of the stylistic detail.
If the writing itself is the bottleneck rather than the formatting, our thesis writing support works through it chapter by chapter with you.
