Then create a data base on the World-Wide Web that provides free and instantaneous access to graduate students' research, which has traditionally been difficult to get. Electronic submissions also would jazz up graduate work, officials here say, by allowing students to include sound and video clips, interactive simulations, and more color illustrations than are possible on paper.
Librarians here point to other benefits of electronic dissertations as well.
Moving dissertations to cyberspace would free precious shelf space in university libraries. And in the process of putting their work on line, students would learn valuable computer skills. But not everyone agrees that achieving this vision of electronic dissertations is possible, or even desirable. Some scholarly societies have instituted policies against electronic publishing of dissertations, arguing that research is not ready for prime time until it has been carefully reviewed by peers. Other critics say that while the bells and whistles possible in computerized dissertations are interesting, most master's-degree and doctoral students are better off taking their printouts to Kinko's.