I wish to direct a thesis

The Autorisation à Diriger une Thèse (ADT) allows a person who does not hold an Habilitation à Diriger des Recherches (HDR) to direct a thesis.

It is aimed at personalities, falling under the 2nd paragraph of article 16 of the decree of 25 May 2016 cited below, who hold a doctorate, and in particular to Research Fellows of EPST and to University Lecturers.

Paragraph 2 of Article 16 of the Order of 25 May 2016
"The duties of the thesis director or co-director may be carried out :
1° By professors and assimilated staff within the meaning of article 6 of decree n° 92-70 relating to the National Council of Universities and article 5 of decree n° 87-31 for health disciplines, or by teachers of equivalent rank who do not come under the Ministry of Higher Education, by staff of higher education establishments, public research bodies and research foundations, who hold a habilitation to direct research;
2° By other personalities who hold a doctorate, chosen for their scientific competence by the head of the establishment, on the proposal of the director of the doctoral school and after the opinion of the research commission of the academic council or the equivalent body in the establishment in which they are registered.
The Autorisation à Diriger une Thèse de Doctorat (ADTD) may be granted to the person concerned on condition that he or she undertakes to defend the HDR before the end of the thesis.

Modalities

The interested party must send the director of the Doctoral School concerned, with a copy to the ED manager (gestion-ed@univ-avignon.fr), a file including :
- A 15 to 20 page CV outlining his/her research activity, main administrative and teaching responsibilities (if any) and involvement in supervising second and potentially 3ᵉ cycle students ;
- A letter supporting the application and undertaking to defend the HDR within three years of the official completion of the thesis.

The Authorisation to Supervise a Doctoral Thesis is granted by the President of the university, on the proposal of the Director of the Doctoral School concerned, after receiving the opinion of the Doctoral School Council and the Restricted Research Commission.
Applications are made on a rolling basis.

Each year, the EDs open a competition for the attribution of doctoral contracts (DC).
The competition is open to students of all nationalities who hold a Master's degree or equivalent. There is no age limit for candidates.
Thesis topics proposed by the laboratories are published on the ED websites. Applications must be submitted on the ADUM platform. The thesis director is responsible for shortlisting candidates. The laboratory director sends the names of the shortlisted candidates to the ED secretariat.

Selection of candidates and organisation of the competition

• Step 1: each laboratory makes an initial selection of candidates (2 to 3) for the contract awarded, according to its own procedures.
• Step 2: each laboratory director sends a file for each pre-selected candidate to the ED.
• Step 3: the competition
  The ED invites the candidates to the audition. The jury is made up of members of the ED Council (excluding doctoral students). To these members must be added, for each discipline or laboratory represented in the competition, one scientist from outside the institution with an HdR, proposed by the director of the unit concerned to the ED director.NB: A researcher or teacher-researcher cannot sit on the jury if he/she is involved in directing a thesis project. If this is the case, the scientist in question will propose a substitute HDR to the ED director.
  Audition for ED 536 : 10 min presentation by the candidate + 10 min discussion with the jury
  Audition for ED 537 : 15 min presentation by the candidate + 25 min discussion with the jury
  A presentation of no more than 5 slides is recommended:
  - Slide 1: CV
  - Slides 2 to 4: research experience (M2 internship or other) or, failing that, a short presentation on a scientific subject of the candidate's choice that has aroused particular interest during his/her training.
  - Slide 5: consistency between the candidate's background, career plan and thesis topic

Video conferencing : Candidates are allowed to make a presentation via video conference.

Typical calendar
Mid-March: posting of thesis topics on the ED website
Mid-May: transmission to the ED secretariat of the pre-selections of the candidates by the laboratories and of the corresponding subjects (at most 4 candidates & 3 subjects per laboratory, a candidate can choose 1 or 2 subjects)
Mid-May: communication by the laboratory directors to the ED secretariat of the proposals of external or internal scientific personalities for the constitution of the jury
End of May - Beginning of June: audition of candidates

Employment of Young Doctoral Students (EJD)

The 2024 call for projects is now closed. The next call will be launched at the beginning of 2025.

CIFRE

For any request for a letter of engagement of the doctoral student by the director of the ED (ANRT request), please attach to gestion-ed@univ-avignon.fr :
- a description of the candidate selection process in a supporting letter from the thesis director
- the title of the thesis and a description of the subject (1/2 page)
- a cv of the candidate
- a master's degree transcript or equivalent with classification
The certificate of employment must be sent at the time of the first registration to justify the financing. Once the certificate of attribution by the ANRT is obtained, please send it to the ED.

Calendar 2022

► Thesis subjects are sent to the ED to be put online on the ED website: 7 March 2022

► Forwarding to the ED of the pre-selection of candidates made by the laboratories: 2 to 3 candidates for each contract; and forwarding to the ED by each laboratory director of the contact details of the proposed external rapporteur and, if necessary, of the internal rapporteur of the institution, for the constitution of the jury:
ED 536: 11 May 2022
ED 537: 18 May 2022

► Hearing of the candidates of FR Agorantic and SFR Tersys Wednesday 8 June 2022
► Audition of ED 536 and 537 candidates: Thursday 2 and Friday 3 June 2022

Doctoral Contracts Established 2022 by Doctoral School

Selected laboratories :

Doctoral School 536 Agrosciences and Sciences

- ex-IBMM
- Avignon Mathematics Laboratory
- LAPEC

Doctoral School 537 Culture and Heritage

- CIHAM - History, archaeology, literature of the medieval Christian and Muslim worlds
- Property, Standards, Contracts Laboratory
- Cultural Identity, Texts, Theatricality
- ANHIMA

Doctoral contract ED 536 co-funded AU/Research organisation 2022

Background and objectives:
Avignon University wishes to develop its partnership with research organisations on the Avignon site by supporting ambitious research projects involving units from both partner organisations.
As such, Avignon University will support a thesis co-financing during the academic year 2021/2022 (thesis start: September 2022).
This initiative aims to stimulate the emergence of new collaborations between AU and partner research organisations of the EPST and EPIC type (in particular CNRS, INRAE and EHESS) or to strengthen existing collaborations.

Eligibility rules:
1) The subject must be submitted by a member of the ED 536 "AgroSciences & Sciences".
2) At least one of the two co-directors must be attached to ED 536.
3) Both co-supervisors must have the Habilitation to Supervise Research (HDR) but the possibility of associating non-HDR co-supervisors is recognised.

Selection criteria:
1) Scientific quality of the subject and potential for breakthrough.
2) Potential for academic and/or socio-economic collaborations.

Calendar:
1) 20 January 2022
Deadline for submitting to the doctoral school (gestion-ed@univ-avignon.fr) a detailed description of the thesis project (4 pages max) and the co-financing agreement of the partner research organisation.
2) March 2022
Selection of the thesis proposal benefiting from the AU co-financing after hearing the authors by a jury constituted from the ED 536 council.
3) Early June 2022
Selection of the doctoral student via the ED 536 doctoral contract competition

Doctoral contracts from the PACA Region

By decision of the Research Commission, the laboratories benefiting from a Young Doctoral Employment grant from the PACA Region (regional grant) can choose between the following 2 options:

• rely for the selection of their candidates on the procedure set up by the EDs for ministerial CDs
• carry out their own selection (without recourse to the competition of the DC). In this case, the candidates selected by the laboratories will nevertheless be auditioned by the competent ED council for validation of their application

FR Agorantic doctoral contract "Culture, Heritage, Digital Societies

The doctoral contract awarded by the University of Avignon for the year 2022 to the FR Agorantic "Culture, Heritage, Digital Societies is built around the concept of interdisciplinarity between the Human and Social Sciences and the Information and Communication Sciences and Technologies.
Criteria for the granting of a Doctoral Contract of the FR Agorantic "Culture, Heritage, Digital Societies".

Priority will be given to co-directorships involving two laboratories/units that are members of the FR Agorantic or are in the process of being associated.
One of the co-directors must be a teacher-researcher from the University of Avignon;
The adequacy between the project, the scientific axes of the RF and the candidate;
The call for proposals is open to students of any nationality, without age limit, according to the rules of the 2 ED 536 & 537 of the University of Avignon
The quality of the candidates is a major criterion for the selection of applications.

Topics should be sent to agorantic@univ-avignon.fr

Candidates' applications must be received by FR Agorantic no later than 28 February 2022.
The selection of the candidates auditioned will take place on 8 June 2022.