'Thesis Advisor Assignment Program', which was developed within the scope of Student Affairs Information System, is one of the applications that are involved in web based Postgraduate Information System that was first implemented in Turkey.

The program #71 has been available since January 2002 at the "Ms-Phd Advisor Assignment" link in the program list provided at http://oibs.metu.edu.tr.

The main aim of the program is to keep the thesis information records of the postgraduate and doctorate students in electronic environment, to facilitate retrieval by the related authorized personnel of information when needed and to perform the required applications on the data. The students and advisors initiate the first operations on the program. The next academic rank that the program addresses to is the department, which has the authority to inspect and act as a secondary user of the program. The institutes have the authority to do top level superintendence; therefore the program addresses the institutes as well.

The student enrolled to a masters program with thesis or to a Ph.D. program, should choose a person who is working as an academician in the University or a person not working in the University but accepted by the institute to be a competent advisor to the student. The student should declare to the program the name of the advisor he/she chooses. Next, the advisor should declare in the program that the student wants to be his/her student; then the advisor should declare that he/she accepts to be the advisor of this student. Finally, the institute of the student's department should approve these declarations officially.

One of the advantages of the Thesis Advisor Assignment Program is that the data kept can be inspected within the rules set under the control mechanism that the automation provides. Despite the fact there may be regulations some of which may seem rigid, tiresome and repetitious to human nature, the users should be able to see that these regulations are vital for the smooth operation of the program without being inefficient. When the probabilities are calculated well, the control mechanism to be applied on the data available at electronic medium is not a very difficult task at all.

As a result of the most significant checks that were made by the program during the registration period of the last semester, the postgraduate students that still have not assigned an advisor to themselves in their third year or after, were not permitted to use the registration program. However, this restriction may seem burdensome to another users of the program. In fact, the difference between those people who intend to pursue a serious postgraduate training and those people whose academic career concerns are governed by sole expediency is revealed by this restriction.

'Thesis Advisor Assignment Program' was designed to achieve maximum user friendliness that could facilitate each step that the user has to take; however, the feedback received from the individuals or academic units reveal that during the different levels of this new program, the users are experiencing problems with the usage. The most critical remarks are apparently about the approval procedure that the student has to go through when the student decides to assign a new assistant to himself/herself. The approval mechanism that was designed according to and in conformity to the University regulations regarding the assignment of another thesis advisor is sometimes an undesirable and objectionable feature for the student. Because, the students sometimes do not want to meet with their ex-advisors personally or the students simply do not know which steps they should follow to assign a new advisor to themselves. To sum up the point, there are three basic steps that should be followed during the thesis advisor assignment period:

• The student should select for himself/herself a new advisor from the program.
• The former advisor should declare via using the program that he/she would not be the advisor of this student anymore.
• The new advisor should accept via using the program that he/she would be the advisor of the student.

In the final step, this alteration of the information about the student's advisor shall be declared to the institute to obtain final official acceptance.User questions, opinions, remarks and suggestions about 'Thesis Advisor Assignment Program' #71 are sincerely welcome to the e-mail address (ms-phd@metu.edu.tr) available at the end of every program page.

Özgür Orgun