Find a thesis or dissertation in our collection

Masters theses or doctoral dissertations / D.Min. project reports / CBA projects

Students completing certain degree programs at our institutions have submitted theses or dissertations in partial fulfillment of their degree requirements. You can find copies of those works in our collection using the techniques described here.

If you are searching for dissertations or theses submitted at other institutions (which will probably not be in our collection), you may search for those using ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, accessible through our Online Databases page.

The Ph.D., Th.D., Ed.D., S.T.M. and Th.M. degrees at Union Theological Seminary in Virginia (1812-1996) and our federated institution, Union-PSCE (1996-present) have required research and writing throughout their history. The General Assembly's Training School and its successor, the Presbyterian School of Christian Education (1914-1996) also required thesis projects for their M.A. and M.R.E. degrees.

A copy of each of these works is held in our Special Collections, and in most cases, a second copy is in the stacks for easier access. If you know the title or author of such a work, you can search our catalog for it just like you would for any other book. If you wish to find all of the theses or dissertations in our collection about a certain topic, use the following technique.

Masters theses or doctoral dissertations

Use the Advanced Search screen to find these materials. You are able to enter a topical search term, such as Psalms, in one of the search fields. If you wish to specify only works written for a particular degree, enter that as a second search term. Click on the Yes button beside Words adjacent for the most accurate search. (If you want to retrieve theses or dissertations written for all of our various research degrees rather than a specific one, then just leave that line blank).

Now, find the area of the screen headed Limit search to :

Open the drop-down menu beside the words Material Types, and click on the word Thesis to select it. Once all of these choices are in place, click on Go.

On the right side of the screen below the words No. of records, you can see that there are 7 theses or dissertations in our collection about the Book of Psalms, and there are 132 Ph.D. dissertations on all topics. These sets are combined to yield two Ph.D. dissertations in our collection about the Psalms -- note the number 2 beside the word Total. To view these records, click on that number.

When you look at the Holdings information for these works, you see that we own two copies of each of them -- one in the Archives, and one available for regular loan in the circulating collection.