Know about Scholarships and How to get them

Types of scholarships

Three types

ü      Fellowships

ü      Assistantships

ü      Grants

FELLOWSHIPS

·        Offered at the beginning of graduate level

·        No work obligation

·        Granted to any one on the basis of merit

·        Range $ 1K- $15K (Thousand)

·        Covers living expense, sometimes also includes tuition and fees

ASSISTANTSHIPS:
Assistantships are not just employment relationships. It is an integral and important part of graduate education. Assistantships range from $ 5K-$ 30K per year, with 10-20 hours of work per week.

• Teaching Assistantship (TA)
  * covers salary with full or partial tuition fee remission
  * Health benefit may or may not included
  * involves teaching undergraduate classes, grading papers, and monitoring labs.
  * may involve attending undergraduate classs and carrying lighter courses loads which will kill your time.
• Research Assistantship (RA)
  * Similar to Above
  * involves research assignment in your discipline
  * the best part of it is that it supports your thesis dissertation.

GRANTS

v      Mostly advanced level graduate students are qualified for the grants.

v      It is provided to pursue special projects.

v      Amount ranges from $1K- 3K, more than $10 K is rare

v      it does not include living cost

v      Skills required to receive grants are, originality, importance of the research work and ability to carry out research successfully.

HOW TO WIN SCHOLORSHIPS

o       Professor control must of the assistantships.

o        Go to department webpage; communicate; write to them and know about the professors

o       Email to professor and assure him how you can contribute.

o       Present polished and professional application.

o       Correspond properly,
*use proper email address (not like crazyheart@gmail.com), don’t forget to include your email address on the body of your email.
*Write your full name, academic history, years of study completed
*proposed field of study
*which semester/ year you are applying for
*write about your professional work experience.
*Write your GRE, GMAT, and TOEFL scores if you have them now
*Attach your CV.

How to increase your Aids?

·        Request colleges to match your current aid offer

·        Apply to colleges in clusters, most competitive colleges compete for same students

·        Beat the priority deadline

·        Ask politely to speak with the director of financial aid

·        Research outside funding sources available

·        After getting AID do politely bargain to make that aid match to your expenses.

Scholarship myths
* Guaranteed scholarships with high TOEFL/ IELTS scores (Scams)
* High GRE is automatic Scholarships (no guarantee)

* There is no international student scholarship or diversity scholarships (Scams)
* working outside the college (you may not get time)

WHERE TO GO TO FIND RELEVANT INFORMATION

• USEF Library, Look in Petersons Books
• Websites of college and universities
• American library
• Join USEF e-group
• Useful books are:
  Funding for US study (Latest edition)
  Open door (latest edition)
  Petersons Graduate Program Handbook (2009)
  Petersons grants for Graduate and post doctoral study. 5^th edition
  Petersons Scholorships, Grants, and Prizes (2009)

Useful websites are
Funding for US Study: http://www.fundingusstudy.org/
FinAid! Financial Aid, College Scholarships and Student Loans
http://scholar.google.com/  (go to advanced search, type the name of professor or Key words)
Still confused, leave a question here!!!!!!!!!!