The composition of the thesis jury must comply with the following rules, which are imposed by the Doctoral School, by the institutions, and by the legislation in force in the decree of 25 May 2016 setting the national framework for training and the procedures leading to the award of the national doctoral diploma.
Rules imposed by legislation and/or institutions:
- The number of jury members must be between four and eight.
- Half of the members of the jury must be French or foreign personalities from outside the Doctoral School and the doctoral student's enrolment institution, chosen for their scientific or professional competence in the field of research concerned. This rule is reinforced by the Doctoral School, see below.
- At least half of the members of the jury must be Professors or assimilated staff within the meaning of article 6 of decree n◦ 92-70 relating to the Conseil national des universités or teachers of equivalent rank who do not come under the Ministry responsible for higher education. Accordingly, the defence file must specify the academic rank and affiliation of each member of the jury. For juries with an odd number of members, round up.
- The chair of the jury must be a professor or equivalent or a teacher of equivalent rank. This person is designated by the members of the jury on the day of the examination. An emeritus professor may chair the thesis jury, provided that he or she is not the doctoral student.
- The thesis director(s) takes part in the jury, signs the minutes and the defence report, but does not take part in the deliberations or the decision. He/she may neither be rapporteur nor president of the jury (the same applies to the co-director).
- Exceptionally, and with the exception of the chairman, the members of the jury may take part in the oral defense by videoconference or electronic communication means that enable them to be identified and to participate effectively in a collegial deliberation and that meet the technical characteristics guaranteeing continuous and simultaneous transmission of the debates.
- The jury must respect the rules of parity (see below).
- For Claude Bernard Lyon 1 University:
- At least 4 members of the jury, including one external person and one person who can act as jury chairman, must be physically present on the day of the examination. If this condition is not met, the defence will be invalidated.
- The thesis director cannot be the rapporteur for the defence, nor the chairman of the jury (the same applies to the co-director / co-supervisor). Not all co-directors are necessarily members of the jury.
- The jury must include at least one UCBL teacher-researcher, holder of the HDR - Professor or Maı̂tre de Conférences with HDR - who is external to the supervision and authorised to take part in the deliberation, whose presence is required on the day of the defence.
- For INSA:
- The jury must also include at least one teacher-researcher from the institution holding the HDR (Professor or Maı̂tre de Conférences with HDR) whose presence is required on the day of the defence.
Rules imposed by the doctoral school :
For the sake of independence, the InfoMaths Doctoral School wishes to go beyond the rules above and additionally requires the following points:
- The number of external members (outside the Lyon Saint Étienne site, outside the doctoral supervision and outside the company for CIFRE contracts) on the jury plus the external member of the ISC if he or she is part of the jury must represent a strict majority.
- The jury must include at least one rapporteur.
- It is important to ensure that the jury is independent of the candidate's work. Therefore, the application must include a complete list of scientific works (publications, pre-publications, conferences) with all bibliographic references and specifying all co-authors.
Parity rules :
The composition of the jury must allow for a balanced representation of women and men, which is determined independently by the various institutions.
| Université Lyon 1 | |
| Number of members of the jury | Possible configuration |
| 4 members | 2 men–2 women |
| 5 members | 2 men–3 women or conversely |
| 6 members | 3 men–3 women or 2 men–4 women or conversely |
| 7 members | 3 men–4 women or conversely |
| 8 members | 4 men–4 women or 3 men–5 women or conversely |
| INSA de Lyon | |
| Number of members of the jury | Possible configuration |
| from 4 to 6 members | at least1 femme |
| from 7 to 8 members | at least2 women |
| École Centrale de Lyon | |
| Number of members of the jury | Possible configuration |
| from 4 to 8 members | at least 2 women |
| ENS de Lyon | |
| Number of members of the jury | Possible configuration |
| up to 5 members | at least une woman and one man |
| from 6 to 8 members | at least two women and two men |
| Université Lyon 2 | |
| Number of members of the jury | Possible configuration |
| from 4 to 8 members | at least 40% women and at least 40% men |
Lyon 3 should follow Lyon 1's constraints.
Role of guests: The notion of guests on a jury (often used to exceed the limit on the number of members) has no legal basis. These guests must under no circumstances take part in the deliberations, which must be strictly limited to the members of the jury, otherwise the deliberations will be invalid.