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Before the end of the Junior year, students shall choose the Thesis or the Oral Examination option and communicate their choice to the Department chair. For the Thesis, the student shall choose an advisor (normally from among the department faculty) to assist in developing and ultimately to approve a thesis topic. While the selection of the topic is left to the judgment of the advisor, it may, by way of example, include translation and commentary, text critical analysis, or research on broader issues within Classical Studies, which may include interdisciplinary components. The thesis shall be approximately 6,500 words; if presented as thesis in Classics and another major, it shall be approximately 13,000 words. The thesis or its classical component shall be assigned a letter grade by the thesis advisor. For the Oral Examination option, topics of examination shall be drawn both from the major courses take by the student and a reading list to be identified by the department faculty. The student shall be examined by a committee of faculty selected by the department chair and the committee shall assign a letter grade to the student’s performance.