Giving structured feedback on thesis drafts without replacing the supervisor

Usage context

A thesis supervisor or graduate advisor overseeing 5–15 students at different stages who needs to give timely, quality feedback on written drafts without letting workload compress the quality of that feedback. This prompt helps prepare structured comments on a chapter or section submitted by a student, keeping the supervisor in the role of final reviewer and decision-maker.

Paste before

The student's draft text, with any identifiable participant data removed first if the research involves human subjects (anonymize before pasting):

• Chapter or section name/number.
• Thesis stage (proposal / literature review / methodology / results / discussion).
• Your evaluation criteria or expectations for this stage.
• Any feedback you gave on a previous version that you asked the student to address.

You are an academic feedback assistant for thesis supervisors. Your job is to help me prepare structured comments on a student's thesis draft. You are not the supervisor — I am. I will make all final decisions about the text. Your role is to help me organize and articulate feedback, not to replace my judgment.

Student draft:
{{draft_text}}

Supervision context:
- Chapter/section: {{chapter_section}}
- Thesis stage: {{thesis_stage}}
- Criteria or expectations for this section: {{criteria}}
- Previous feedback I gave: {{previous_feedback}}

Please:
1. Identify the three strongest aspects of the text. For each, explain specifically what works and why it matters for the thesis.
2. Identify the two or three most important weaknesses. For each: describe it precisely, explain why it's a problem, and formulate a guiding question that could lead the student to improve it on their own.
3. If there are formal issues (citation style, structure, inconsistencies between sections), note them briefly — separated from the substantive observations.
4. Propose one or two follow-up questions I can ask the student in our next meeting to check their understanding of the feedback.
5. Draft a summary paragraph on the state of this draft — honest and constructive — that I can use as the opening of my response email to the student.

Tone: academic, direct, constructive. Don't soften real problems, but don't overstate them either.

Expected output

STRENGTHS

1. The literature review (pp. 12–18) shows coherent handling of primary sources on [topic]. The student connects [Author A]'s contributions with [Author B] in a way that strengthens the theoretical framework.

MAIN WEAKNESSES

1. The problem statement (pp. 3–5) does not yet specify the knowledge gap that justifies this research. Guiding question: What exists in the literature on this topic that your research is trying to correct, extend, or challenge?

SUMMARY PARAGRAPH FOR THE EMAIL
"Thank you for sending this draft. The theoretical framework shows clear progress from the previous version. The main challenge for the next stage is sharpening the problem statement so the research question emerges with more logical necessity..."

Watch out for

• If the student's text includes data from human research participants (interviews, surveys, case studies), anonymize before pasting: remove names, identifiable institutions, job titles that could reveal who spoke. A thesis draft should not be pasted in full to an external AI model if it contains sensitive research data.
• The model may flag disciplinary problems outside its actual competence (statistical errors, domain-specific methodological issues). Always validate with your own expert reading.
• AI-generated feedback tends to be softer than warranted. If a particular student needs more direct feedback, adjust the tone explicitly before sending.

Suggested iteration

If the draft has a serious argument-level problem: "The text has a structural problem with its central argument. Help me describe it to the student in a way that leads them to understand the problem without telling them exactly how to fix it."

If you want to turn the feedback into a meeting agenda: "Convert this feedback into an agenda for a 30-minute meeting with the student: what to discuss, in what order, and what to agree on by the end."