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Tuition Scholarships Now Available to Ph.D. Students in Their Sixth Year

The Graduate School is now extending tuition scholarships to sixth-year Ph.D. students.
The Graduate School is now extending tuition scholarships to sixth-year Ph.D. students.

Duke will begin providing tuition scholarships for Ph.D. students in their sixth year who have no other sources of tuition support, The Graduate School announced last week.

The new financial support is effective immediately, said Paula D. McClain, dean of The Graduate School, in an email announcement to Ph.D. students. 

All Ph.D. students at Duke are guaranteed funding for their first five years, which includes tuition coverage. After the fifth year, tuition becomes the responsibility of the student, though most students in their sixth year or beyond have external or departmental funding to cover tuition. Of the approximately 2,500 Ph.D. students at Duke each year, about 3 percent actually end up paying tuition out of pocket.

“Most of our students who go into a sixth year are able to obtain external or departmental funding that includes tuition support,” McClain said. “A small number, however, are not. The new scholarships will cover tuition for those students in their sixth year.”

For fall 2017 and spring 2018, the new tuition scholarships will be awarded to any sixth-year Ph.D. student who doesn't have external or departmental tuition support. Beginning in fall 2018, sixth-year Ph.D. students who don’t have external or departmental tuition support will be eligible for tuition scholarships as long as they have applied for external funding or competitive Graduate School funding during the current or previous academic year.

McClain credited Provost Sally Kornbluth, Trinity Dean Valerie Ashby, and the Graduate and Professional Student Council for their collaboration in creating the new tuition scholarships.

“Like many of our existing student resources, these new scholarships were the result of direct collaboration between students and administrators at various levels throughout Duke,” McClain said.