PhD thesis in Kuwait: admission, scholarships and the defense

Kuwait has one major public doctoral provider, Kuwait University, and a small set of doctoral programs elsewhere. Most Kuwaitis who want a PhD in a field the university does not offer go abroad on a Ministry of Higher Education scholarship. This guide covers both routes. Rules change by program and by year, so each figure below points you to the page you must check before you apply.

The document at the center of the degree is a thesis in most countries and a dissertation in the United States. Kuwait University documents use both words, and this guide treats them as the same work.

Doctoral study in Kuwait

Kuwait University's College of Graduate Studies sets the minimum rules, and each academic program adds its own. Private universities such as the Gulf University for Science and Technology are accredited by the Private Universities Council, but the doctoral offer outside Kuwait University is narrow, so confirm that your field exists before you plan around it.

Admission

The published conditions have this common core:

• A master's degree conferred by Kuwait University or a recognized institution.
• An exam for outside graduates. Applicants whose master's degree comes from another institution must pass one or more tests set by the academic program, to show they are prepared for doctoral study.
• Language. Applicants with an outside master's degree must be proficient in the language of instruction of the program, which is Arabic in some colleges and English in others.
• A minimum grade. Programs set their own. The mathematics program, for example, expects a GPA of at least 3.00 out of 4.00 in a master's degree equivalent to its own. The history program's published figures include a minimum GPA of 2.67, an admission exam score of at least 65 percent and English evidence, according to a program listing. Check the current page of your program.

The College of Graduate Studies also runs a Graduate Studies Excellence Scholarship for thesis-based master's and doctoral students, open to national and international applicants, with its own admission requirements. Read the conditions on the college's site.

The stages

1. Coursework, as set by the program. Some courses must be at 500 level or above and not previously used toward a master's degree.
2. Qualifying examination. The College forms a qualifying examination committee, chaired by your academic supervisor, on the program committee's recommendation.
3. Research and writing.
4. External review and public defense. In at least some programs, the dissertation is sent to an external examiner chosen by the College with the program committee and your supervisor, and it is defended publicly.

Master's programs with a thesis end in a defense exam too, so Kuwait University graduates arrive at the doctorate with the format already familiar.

Studying abroad on a Kuwaiti scholarship

The Ministry of Higher Education runs the scholarship program, and the Cultural Offices of the Kuwaiti embassies administer it in each host country. Offices exist in Washington DC, Los Angeles, Canada, Canberra and London, among others. The rules published in English by the Cultural Offices share these features:

• Citizenship. You must be a Kuwaiti citizen.
• Approved universities. You must study at an institution the Ministry approves, in coordination with the Cultural Office and Kuwait's national accreditation body. Foreign universities ask the Cultural Office to add their programs to the approved list. Several universities, among them Robert Gordon University in Scotland and the Australian National University, publish that they are on the list.
• Approved majors. Your declared field must be on the Ministry's list for scholarships.
• Order of steps. You apply to the Cultural Office first and then secure admission to an approved school, according to scholarship advisers.
• Study plan. The Ministry has asked applicants to submit a study plan to the Cultural Office.
• Changes. A student can freeze a scholarship only after a Cultural Office recommendation and Ministry approval.

Most of the English-language checklists on the Cultural Office sites describe the undergraduate scholarship. The conditions for postgraduate and doctoral students, including how the Ministry treats a degree you finance first, sit in the Ministry's scholarship regulations, so read those and ask your Cultural Office directly before you accept an offer or pay a deposit.

Applying to US, UK and other universities

The admission side is the same as for other Gulf applicants. Read how Gulf and Turkish students apply for a PhD in the US or UK, then the guides for the US, UK, Canada and Australia. Canadian universities, for example, note that applicants from Kuwaiti universities where English is not the main language of instruction must submit an English test. How to write a PhD research proposal for international applications covers the proposal.

Before you apply, check

• Whether Kuwait University or another institution offers your field at doctoral level.
• The entrance exam and the minimum grade for your program.
• The language of instruction and of the thesis.
• Your Cultural Office's current conditions for postgraduate scholarships.
• Whether your target foreign university is on the approved list for your major.

Writing the thesis or dissertation in English

Candidates who write their doctoral thesis in English as an additional language meet the same problems again and again: long sentences that carry several ideas, paragraphs that open with background and reach the claim late, drifting articles and prepositions, and two citation styles in one document. TDM's editing corrects those and leaves the argument yours. Our formatting service brings the document into your university's template, and the 12 common defense questions prepare you for the examination.