<p>I notice many UC grad school programs in Chemistry cover fees as well as provide a stipend.Is there anything I have to cover on my own? I have heard from peers that as a PhD candidate that all fees and expenses are covered...</p>
<p>To get funding for your research so that, as a graduate student working on your dissertation, you don’t have to be entirely supported by money from the University where you are enrolled.</p>
<p>It’s also a great thing to put on your CV – it’s a prestigious award to win. </p>
<p>Some universities/programs will give a small stipend bonus to students who win an outside fellowship, but not all. The point of applying for an outside fellowship is not that you need to cover your school expenses, but that it’s useful for you in terms of your CV and for your department/advisor in terms of not having to pay for you.</p>
<p>Think of it as funding to work on whatever you want to work on. Funding from the department or a faculty grant will either require a work commitment unrelated to your own research (e.g. TA work or research assistance on a different project) or your work is locked in to whatever the grant of your PI is funding. </p>
<p>The NSF stipend might also be more than the standard departmental support for graduate students, and having outside funding might get you accepted to programs that would otherwise reject you.</p>
<p>Even prominent groups might not have research assistant funding for you for all 4-6 years of your Ph.D. NSF is at least guaranteed funding for three years.</p>
<p>thanks for the responses guys!</p>
<p>gthopeful: In that case what if you run out of funding and you have no outside fellowship?</p>
<p>You have other choices: you can pay out of pocket, or you can borrow loans, or you can get a job at the school and attempt to get a tuition waiver. You can also take a leave of absence until you do get funding, or you can leave the program altogether. That’s one of the reasons you should apply for external funding even when you don’t need it - because you never really know when you will.</p>
<p>What is the criteria for obtaining NSF grants and government fellowships? Grades and research?</p>
<p>Here are the review criteria for the NSF fellowship: [Review</a> Criteria - NSF Graduate Research Fellowships Program (GRFP)](<a href=“http://www.nsfgrfp.org/how_to_apply/review_criteria]Review”>http://www.nsfgrfp.org/how_to_apply/review_criteria)</p>
<p>Grades and past research (and maybe more importantly, your letters of recommendation!) will help with the “intellectual merit” part of the application. And then there’s “broader impacts” which most applicants need to get a bit creative for…</p>
<p>When you apply for NSF, you submit</p>
<p>1) An information sheet with your grades and GRE scores, as well as honors and awards you have won in the past and what university you go to, plus your undergraduate and graduate transcripts</p>
<p>2) An essay describing your personal reasons for wanting to get a PhD and how the NSF will enhance your personal dedication for pursuing a doctoral degree.</p>
<p>3) An essay describing how your past research and educational experiences contribute to your ability to conduct research and become a science scholar</p>
<p>4) A research proposal: an essay describing a research project that you intend to carry out, including the theoretical framework, the reasons, the methods, and how your university will support you in this endeavor</p>
<p>5) Letters of recommendation from 3 faculty members.</p>
<p>All of those things are taken into consideration. In my experience, the grades and GRE scores are kind of a cut point - you have to make a certain point to be considered but after that, the emphasis shifts to your essays and letters. NSF wants to see strong support for you as a student from either your undergraduate mentors, your graduate mentors, or both. Undergraduate professors will need to discuss your maturity and focus and their perceptions of our ability to complete a rigorous PhD program AND the research that you propose to undertake. Graduate professors need to do all of that PLUS be able to comment how they will be able to support you in your endeavors.</p>
<p>They also want to see that you can realistically plan and execute a research project, which is why the proposal is required. NSF also grades you on two critera: intellectual merit and broader impact. They want to see intellectual merit in your 3 essays as well as your accomplishments as a graduate student, but especially in that research proposal. What does your proposed research contribute to your field? Is it original, does it expand an existing framework, does it push the field to new limits? That’s what they want to see. The broader impact has a lot to do with diversity but is not limited to diverse experiences. They want to see that the science you propose to undertake, as well as your past experiences, encompass extending science to make a broader impact on U.S. or world society. That’s embodied in your work - does your research propose to solve a question that will improve the human condition? - but also in your past. What kinds of things have you done that improve the human condition as it relates to science?</p>
<p>In my successful NSF application I mentioned tutoring disadvantaged students on the GRE and SAT, volunteering at a predominantly black elementary school encouraging college aspirations and science education, and conducting my senior thesis on science education in African American undergraduates as part of my “broader impact.” I also wrote about how I wanted to teach statistics and research methods and be a role model and mentor for underrepresented students in those fields. That was important to me because I’m underrepresented in those fields and role modeling helped me get to where I am, but you don’t have to be an URM to get an NSF nor do you have to have volunteered with URM to get one. I emphasized that I wanted to teach ALL students, not just URM, not to be afraid of stats and methods and to encourage them to go into the science workforce.</p>
<p>I also made sure that my past research experiences showed a continuous connection between seemingly unconnected research experiences. I added a sentence after each paragraph describing my past work to explain how that work connected with the work I had planned as a graduate student. That’s the intellectual merit - how you show them that your work was a carefully planned, built map to where you are now (even if it totally wasn’t, lol).</p>
<p>So tl;dr: grades and GRE a little bit; past experiences and preparedness for research a lot; and support of your professors and the strength of your research proposal a whole whole lot. Also they will be looking at the fit between your program and your interests.</p>
<p>Not all PhD programs will pay for all your years. At some of Stanford’s engineering PhD programs for example, many (and sometimes most) PhD students will not be funded until they find an advisor but they can’t do that in practice until they complete some other requirements (such as passing the qualifying exam or finishing the MS). So it’s standard in some departments to have to pay for your first year (and second year, if you take longer) – that’s $40,000 in tuition and fees and remember that you’re not getting a stipend so the net difference compared to having an NSF fellowship is $70,000 for just that first year.</p>
<p>Other bonuses: it’s prestigious enough to remain on your CV until you retire and it gives you more freedom when picking an advisor and picking projects after getting an advisor.</p>
<p>Julliet or anyone else who has an idea, what are the cut points (GPA and GRE) for eligibility?</p>