Monday, April 13, 3-5pm

Defending your non-thesis master’s project

A requirement of the MS non-thesis degree is to defend a project that is reflective of both the breadth and scope of master’s research in MEMS.  Students have a project advisor with whom they work closely on a relevant and timely problem in the advisor’s area of expertise.  The work culminates in a poster that is presented and defended at an expo that is open to the Duke community.

If you are a THRUST MEng student, please skip to the THRUST section below.

This Expo is intended to be a celebration and recognition of all the hard work the students and faculty have accomplished together.

This poster defense is a requirement for MS non-thesis students and is optional for MS thesis students.  The thesis students may elect to participate in order to compete for the Best Master’s Poster Award which is determined at this event.

The guidelines and details for the 2020 Spring Master’s Poster Expo are as follows:

  • Friday, April 10: 9pm
    • Submit your poster (pdf format) and 5- to 7-minute video (any video format) to the online form found here.
    • Poster and video presentation guidelines are found at the bottom of this page.
    • This form will be activated at 10am Friday, April 10
  • Faculty Preparation: April 11 – April 13
    • The respective committee members are provided with the videos and poster files for each of their students.  They review the videos and prepare questions for the defense.
    • Students and faculty will receive a schedule listing their defense time slot on Monday.
  • Monday, April 13: 3-5 PM (Password-protected virtual room here)
    • The final schedule for the Expo is as follows:
    • First Name Last Name Project Chair Order
      Fan Jiayue Fan Bridgeman, Leila 1
      Xusheng Luo Luo Zavlanos, Michael 2
      Mu Jia Jia Zavlanos, Michael 3
      Putong Kang Kang Huang, Tony Jun 4
      Zhang, Wendi Zhang Aquino, Wilkins 5
      Yibing Lyu Lyu Codd, Patrick 6
      Yuan Song yuan Yellen, Benjamin 7
      Yijun Mao Mao Buckland, Daniel 8
      Kevin Rosenthal Rosenthal Buckland, Daniel 9
      Yiteng Lu Lu Buckland, Daniel 10
      Jing Zhang Zhang Buckland, Daniel 11
      Meghan Booze Booze Hall, Kenneth 12
    • All students, advisors, and committee members meet in this virtual room at 2:45 PM to begin a roll call while ensuring audio-visual capabilities.A breakout room(s) will be set up for the committee(s) where the respective students are invited to defend their projects.
    • Once the time slot is over, the student returns to the main meeting room while the faculty committee deliberate a decision
      • The committee will fill out the assessment for that was provided to them via email.
      • This form constitutes the student’s project exam card.  The information will relayed to The Graduate School in preparation for a degree audit and graduation.

THRUST Program: Poster Session on Monday, April 20, 3-5 PM

Similar to the non-thesis MS students, a project poster is also required for your program completion.  The only difference is timing of your poster expo.  Going forward, our hope is that all poster sessions take place concurrently.  Spring 2020 has posed challenges that prevent that from happening this semester.

The guidelines and details for the 2020 Spring Master’s Poster Expo are as follows:

  • Friday, April 17: 5pm
    • Prepare a 7-minute video using charts (pdf, 4 or 5)
    • No group videos to be uploaded to DukeBox folder that will be provided to students by Prof Kielb.
  • Monday, April 20, 3pm to 5pm
    • Virtual Poster Session in which each student will have a 10-minute question/answer session with faculty
  • Friday, April 24, 5pm
    • Final Report Submission Deadline
    • Can be group reports, but each student’s sections need to be clearly labeled

Poster and Video Presentation Guidelines

Please review these important details about your video presentation:

  • make sure the sound and video quality are good before you upload
    • you will only get ONE chance to upload and submit both your poster and video
  • be mindful of your background
    • you do not want the rest of the world to see your bedroom!
  • you do not have to show a video of yourself, but a picture at the beginning and at the end would be advisable
    • introduce yourself and talk about your project advisor before you start
    • it is recommended that you discuss the larger context of your work before you start talking about your project
    • make sure you thank people for watching at the end
  • in preparing your presentation, it is helpful to think about the five components that most scientific reports should address: 
    • Motivation: Why is your research important?
    • Background: What has been done prior to your work?  
    • Setup: What is your experimental/computational/theoretical approach? 
    • Results: What new results have you obtained? What is your interpretation? 
    • Impact: What difference has your research made? How does it inform future work?
  • Note that you are not required to use the above sections; use your own voice and style in delivering the narrative of your project
  • You may elect to show your poster and then go into a slide deck to discuss your project
    • A regular presentation, in other words