-ACSD- Fully funded Ph.D in Higher Ed

[Josh Arnold]

While at the conference a few weeks ago, I had an opportunity to meet a doctoral student in Bowling Green's Ph.D program in higher education administration. Much to my surprise, she shared with me that the program at Bowling Green is fully funded (I had never heard of such a thing among programs in higher education). I thought many of you would be intrigued by this news as well, and was curious to know if anyone has heard of other fully funded doctorates (ph.d or ed.d) in either higher education administration, educational leadership, or leadership studies?

Joshua Arnold
Men's Quad RD/Director of Housing
Tabor College
400 S. Jefferson Street
Hillsboro, KS 67063
(620) 877-7162
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[Chamberlain, Todd Allan]

Most of the larger programs are "fully" funded, if by that you mean there's full tuition coverage and a stipend paid, at least for 3-4 years of coursework. It may not be automatic on admission, but the assistantships come with compensation that covers the basic expenses of attending. This is for people attending part-time of course. There is generally little funding for people wanting to attend part-time. Depending on the tuition arrangement, it may actually be more economical to attend school full-time for several years and forego a regular salary. When the stipend and the value of the tuition are combined, when you figure out the hourly compensation rate based on a 20-hour/week assistantship, the pay rate may actually be better than what you'd make at a full-time job. Not to say you'd want to stay in school forever, but if you're trying to do school and work at the same time, the extra salary may not make up for the tuition expense. Going full-time isn't an option for everyone, but I've known plenty of families with children who lived comfortably while in doctoral programs.

Todd

Todd Chamberlain
Assistant Director for Survey Operations
National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE)

[Josh Arnold]

That's good information to know. Most of the public ph.d programs are advertising assistantships on their websites, but are reluctant to state how much of the total costs these typically cover. What I liked about Bowling Green is that they guarantee an assistantship that will cover all expenses. It may be a bit daunting to uproot a family and move lock, stock, and barrel for a doctoral program with no assurances of an assistantship that will cover expenses.

Joshua Arnold
Men's Quad RD/Director of Housing
Tabor College
400 S. Jefferson Street
Hillsboro, KS 67063
(620) 877-7162

>>> "Chamberlain, Todd Allan" <toac...@indiana.edu> 06/16/08 9:07 AM >>>

[Chamberlain, Todd Allan]

There are definitely a variety of different arrangements, and it can be hard to get solid details front. Some programs automatically include a funding guarantee as part of acceptance into the program, whereas the assistantship/funding process is separate from admissions in other programs. At IU, for example, once one is accepted into the program it takes some time to apply for openings and see what kind of position can be obtained, and some positions don't open until later. The assistantship providers are fairly independent from the academic department, although the department is getting better at coordinating these relationships. Depending on where you want to go, one may need to take a leap of faith that something will come together.

One note on the "guaranteed" funding programs, though, is to check the number of years of funding. In some (not all) of these programs, funding is only guaranteed for 2-3 years, and after that there really isn't any funding. This can vary by university and program. At IU in the Ed program, once you're in an assistantship you count on sticking around for four years of funding, but I know people who have been pretty well cut off from funding after three years in other situations.