I have asked Ikhlas Mohammed (a recent graduate of the biochemistry master’s program and a student of Dr. Jamillah Zamoon) to write a detailed summary of her experience as a graduate student at KU and a guide for future graduate students.  Below is what Ikhlas sent to me (un-edited).  Thanks Ikhlas!

Your guide for dealing with necessary nonsense work, when in doubt call 24987385 which is the graduate school number for instructions

1. When you are done with 12 credits register for Thesis 1 the next semester.
   1. In the same semester as your first time registration for Thesis 1 hand in:
   2. AC1 (deadline is 3 weeks after start of semester) and
   3. AC2 which includes the proposal & the 1000 KD (deadline 5 weeks after start of the semester)
   4. Both forms should be given to the graduate secretary Lena and she will deliver them to the graduate school but do follow up with her
2. Next semester register for Thesis 2 and plan to submit the 5000 KD proposal
3. Continue to register for thesis 2 even on your final semester, and once you reach your final semester (go to graduate college 2^nd floor and see the dates for the graduate committee, these are the days by which if you don’t hand in everything you will not be considered for graduation till the next committee meeting which should be fine unless you finish around the summer because there is a committee in June but the next one is in Sept or Oct so you can’t graduate if you don’t catch that one) and you are ready to hand in your thesis (First let me just say congratulations that was a very very long road!! )
   1. Fill in AC4 (now this paper is supposedly confidential so you are only allowed to see page 1 of it)
   2. Collect the signature and stamp of your committee (only the signature of committee, the program director and vice dean of academic affairs signature Lena will take care of them):
      1. Your supervisor + 2 other academic people (the one with the higher academic rank put his/her name in the convener space and the other one in the member space).
   3. AC4 is handed in with your printed bound thesis + CD (that has the thesis obviously) and transcript and major sheet
      1. (Both transcript and major sheet you can find them from the college of graduate study room 33 transcripts require 1 KWD stamp and make sure the major sheet is stamped by the employee).
   4. Your supervisor needs to hand the thesis, transcript, major sheet, one CD (containing thesis in both PDF and word format) include these sentences in the CD cover

Kuwait University

Title of thesis

First version

Name + student id

Department/College

Month/Year

And AC4 to Lena, which will address it to vice dean, and he will send it to the college of graduate studies.

4. Once the thesis is handed in the first time it normally takes 3 days to leave the department (depending on when is the vice dean there to sign the paper) and once it reaches there, a paper will be sent to the supervisor to state that the thesis did reach them. It will take an additional 3 days for the thesis to be assessed once it is in the hand of CGS.
5. Once the thesis is back (to your supervisor office) you need to make the requested changes, re-print these changed pages and remove the incorrect pages and replace them with the corrected pages (don’t throw away the incorrect pages). Then save the file in PDF format only into total of 4 CDs and together with a letter from your supervisor stating that you made the correction, the incorrect pages (for CGS to compare and make sure that you’ve made the changes), and the CGS page titled “remarks on manuscript” hand all these to the graduate school second floor the reception. Note: you can reprint the thesis if you don’t want to exchange papers, but why waste trees!
6. It normally takes 2 weeks or more for the graduate school to contact the external referee and get his/her approval for the thesis to be sent to them. Don’t waste time and ask your internal committee if they want copies of the thesis so that they can read it while the wait for external reply is going on (Note: university only sends copies to internal referee once they’ve contacted the external or once the report and the thesis is back from the external (I’m not sure which option they go with, but both options are wasting time). Normally they give the external referee up to 1 week to reply if he/ she want to read the thesis in case of no reply or a negative answer they move to the next referee on the list (graduate school does arrange the 5 names on the list as they like and not as your supervisor originally wrote the names in AC4) if all 5 say no and or didn’t reply the graduate school sends a paper to your supervisor to ask him/her to provide them with 5 more names for external referee (hopefully things will not reach this point) and the process is repeated till there is a positive answer.
7. In the meantime while you are waiting for the external referee report to arrive you can always review for the thesis examination, or do a departmental seminar or participate in poster day or participate in a scientific mission to present that poster or watch YouTube videos! Its your time you figure out how to use it!
8. It took 2.5-3 weeks for the external examiner report to arrive
9. Now fill out AC6 and hand it in to graduate college (2^nd floor the reception). You need to first make the adjustment that the external referee pointed out then sign the paper from your supervisor + internal committee. It is preferred (but not mandatory) to hand in this form 2 weeks before your defense data (I hand it in 3 days before so it really doesn’t matter). For the defense time and location, you need signature of you committee, and then to specify the time and location. To book the conference hall (dean office) first talk to the administrator manager (the room next to the conference hall) to confirm that the time and the date is empty. Then take a paper from the photocopy room near (secretary taj’s room) and fill it with your name / supervisor/ today’s date/ the date you want the room and the time and which room you want) then give it to secretary taj so that she will hand it to the correct people.
10. You also at the same time need to take a clearance form from graduate college 2^nd floor room 33, you need to sign this paper systematically from the first to the last person, 1. The program director (Dr. Fadwa), 2. The library (the 2^nd floor science library), 3. The boy’s dorm in shuwaikh, 4. Safety and security department (where you take your student id from) 5. Management department (in building 2 KH near the corridor that leads to the library) 6. Finance department (near gate 7). Also make sure that the all the signatures include a stamp (and sometimes dates too) and the stamp is repeated on the carbon copy. The next two pages can be filled by you with your details (yes the page is repeated twice but you need to fill both pages). Hand in this form to graduate college room 33 also days before your defense.
11. Today is your defense day Woho, I recommend you eating a cake before the defense (or eating one after you are done or eating one before and after the defense)
12. On the defense day make sure that the convener have the AC7 form and that when all members sign they also stamp and include the date, make sure to also later print 10 copies of the signature page only so that all the members can sign it and you can use these pages for your final bound thesis (and have some spares just in case). The convener should type (computer typed not hand written) the report in the second page of AC7.
13. Either the convener sends the AC7 form to the secretary then from the secretary to the program director or the convener sends the AC7 form to the supervisor (who gives a copy to the secretary) and directly hands it to the program director that will send it to the graduate college. (You can send AC7 after your supervisor makes sure you have made the amendments, you don’t have to send it with the rest of the forms (Ac8-10) it is better to be send first since the printing of the thesis and binding will take some days)
14. Next, save your thesis into 3 CDS (1 CD containing the thesis in both pdf and word format, another CD containing only the title page + abstract both in Arabic and English (also in both word and pdf) and a third CD containing the thesis in pdf only) Imp: make sure that the symbols, the font, the table of contents are all ok when converting to pdf. CD1 & 2 will be given later to the graduate college so set them aside.
15. Next, take CD 3 (pdf only) also take the printed signed signature pages with you and go to Al Alamiah center (map attached) (phone number 22414141, Al-Rai, Al Ghazali Road – beside Electrozan (if using gps set it for electrozan because their location isn’t detectable by Google maps then walk for 100m and their door looks like a house door and go to the first floor. They calculate the number of color and non colored pages you have and ask you how many copies you need and what cover for the book to use (the cover depend on what college you belong to) then they ask you to pay some money in advance and it is up to you how much you pay in advance but better not to pay everything just in case something went wrong I’ve paid only 10% of the price in advance) to print your thesis and bound it there. You need to print 1 copy for yourself, one for the supervisor, one for CGS one for program director (Dr. Fadwa), one for the science library (joint program needs to give both libraries) and one for research administration (if you have been funded by them AC2 and they are the ones that need to sign in the AC8 in the financing source). So 5 or 6 copies (or 7 for joint programs) need to be printed there at Al Alamiah center usually take 4 or 5 working days they don’t work on Friday and they only work from 8 am to 4pm.
16. In AC9 just sign part C if you took nothing from the college (software & books) also let the program director sign part B (even if you took nothing he/she needs to sign).
17. In AC10 you need to attach your civil id copy and bankcard copy (add iban number) so that the university can reimburse you later for the thesis printing fees. In AC8 you need to get the signature and the stamp of all the people who are supposed to receive the thesis final form (mentioned in point 15, so one for the supervisor, one for the library one for program director (Dr. Fadwa) and one for research sector as the finance source if they did finance your thesis) give copies of the sign forms (AC 8-10 to both lena and your supervisor)
18. Next take CD 1 & 2 and one signature page and AC8 to AC10 and bound thesis copy (this is for CGS) to the graduate college third floor room 10 to ester she will check if everything is ok then she will hand you back your papers and the book and any extra copies (of the old thesis for refereeing) she have, next give the cd which have the abstract + title page to room 19 (Aisha) on the same floor. She will check if it is correct and sign AC8 and takes a copy and give you back the paper now take the cd with the full thesis + (AC8-10 + signature paper and the bound thesis) to 2^nd floor graduate college reception.  All these papers needs to be handed 1 week before the date of the graduation committee so that you will be considered for this graduation committee.
19. Next you can check with the graduate college (room 35) when you can expect your certificate to be handed to you (usually takes 1.5 months after the graduate committee meeting, also after the committee meeting date make sure to check with them to see if there are any missing papers (for example they need the paper issued by the program director/ the course professor which allowed you to take an undergraduate course)