The aim of the bachelor's thesis is to develop your skills in conducting scientific research - defining the research task, acquiring and utilizing research material, and writing the research report. 

While working on your bachelor's thesis, you will participate in a seminar designed to support the writing of the thesis. The seminar consists of seminar meetings, drafting the bachelor's thesis, presenting it to the seminar group, and reviewing other students' work.

Seminars are held 1-3 times in an academic year; check the instructions for your major to find out when you are meant to participate in the seminar. The enrolment practices can vary: see the Sisu course description for instructions. More information about the seminar and the bachelor's thesis can be found on your seminar's MyCourses page.

At the beginning of the seminar, you will be assigned a supervisor for your bachelor's thesis who will guide and support your work. If the supervisor named at the beginning of the seminar cannot continue to supervise the thesis due to disqualification or another reason, the head of major will appoint a new supervisor for the student. The teacher in charge of the bachelor's thesis and seminar course evaluates the bachelor's thesis and the seminar. If your thesis supervisor is not one of the teachers in charge, the teacher in charge will assess your performance based on the supervisor's recommendation.

• Use the thesis template for all Aalto University Schools that can be found here. The first page of the submitted file should be the cover page, while the next should be the thesis abstract page. Use the same language in the cover page and abstract as you have in the bachelor’s thesis.
• Please note that the maturity essay is a separate element of the bachelor’s degree, evaluated against a specific set of criteria. You cannot use the thesis abstract of your bachelor’s thesis as your maturity essay. Read more about the maturity essay below on this page.
• Save your file as an archival PDF/A file. Suitable formats: PDF/A-1a, -1b, -2a and -2b. Do not use any other file format.

Cover page and abstract templates (Word) in Finnish and in English are available under the instructions.

Instructions for converting a file to PDF/A compliant version here

1. If you notice an error before the thesis has been evaluated:
   • Suspend the thesis evaluation process by sending an email to the planning officer of your major to programmes-biz@aalto.fi.
2. If you wish to correct an error in your thesis after its evaluation, you can append an errata document to your thesis as instructed below.

The maturity essay is written in Finnish or Swedish or in some cases in English. The maturity essay is an obligatory part of the thesis process for all students regardless of their language of education. Read more about the language of education here.

Write your bachelor’s-level maturity essay in Finnish or Swedish, if one of these languages was your language of education.

• The language of education is usually the one shown as your mother tongue on your school-leaving certificate from upper secondary school.
• If you did not complete the upper secondary school syllabus, but completed an international track of upper secondary studies in Finland or the equivalent of Finnish upper secondary studies abroad, then your language of primary and secondary education is the one shown as your mother tongue in your certificate from comprehensive school.

Write your bachelor’s-level maturity essay in English, if your language of education cannot be determined.

• If neither Finnish or Swedish is shown as your mother tongue on your upper secondary or comprehensive school certificate, then the language of education is most likely undefined in your case.
• You must apply for determination of your proficiency requirements regarding the national languages. The requirements must be determined before you write your maturity essay.
• Read more about determining your language proficiency requirements of the page Exemptions from language requirements.

Write a one-page specialist text based on your thesis. In an analytic and reflective manner, discuss the results or findings of your research as well as their significance. Pay close attention to your choice of genre (see instructions below), your headings and your text’s readability and linguistic clarity. Note as well that your maturity essay must function as an independent piece of writing without references to your thesis.

Option 1: Executive summary

The goal of the summary is to support executive decision-making. In contrast to your thesis abstract, your objective here is to persuade readers to ‘buy’ your research results, convincing them that your research has benefits and practical applications for economic life and/or for business.

Give a clear structure to your text and use headings that describe the contents: present your results or findings and their benefits, substantiate the benefits and target them at the right target audience, then propose a solution for the problem you noted.

Option 2: Media advisory

The aim of a media advisory (or press release) is to present the key findings and significance of your research in such a way that the document may serve as a news item and be published in a newspaper, magazine or on social media. Your task is to raise interest in your thesis topic and show the newsworthiness of your findings.

Write the advisory in the ‘inverted pyramid’ news style, providing the target group with the most important information at the top of the text and then proceeding to the less important. The advisory should have an attention-grabbing headline, its opening should encapsulate the essential matter, and it should have a few subheadings outlining the discussion paragraphs.

Use a Calibri or Calibri-equivalent font for writing your maturity essay. Use font size 11, 1.15 line-spacing and set all margins at 2 cm. You may use these guidelines as a template in English or in Finnish.

Remember to include your name and student number in the file. When your maturity essay is finished, convert it to a PDF file and give the file a name in the form Firstname_Lastname_studentnumber_Maturity_essay.

Submit the maturity essay file in the MyCourses learning environment at the same time as you submit your bachelor’s thesis for approval. Instructions on submitting the thesis and maturity essay are available above on this page.

Your thesis advisor will examine the content of your thesis for your conversance with the topic, and a proofreader will check the language of your thesis. You need to follow the progress of the content and language reviews yourself: see the directions in the MyCourses space for your major.