Next in my series on How To Fully Fund Your PhD, I provide a list below of universities that offer full funding to all students admitted to their doctoral programs and MFA programs in creative arts, writing and film.
In the ProFellow database, we list several competitive fellowships for graduate and doctoral study. However, to be successful in fully-funding your studies I recommend seeking out PhD programs that offer full funding to all admitted students. When a university indicates that they provide full funding to their PhD students, in most cases this means they provide each admitted doctoral student full tuition and a stipend for living expenses for the four to six year duration of the student’s doctoral studies. Not all universities provide full funding to their doctoral students, so be sure to research the financial aid offerings of all the potential PhD programs in your academic field, including small and lesser-known schools both in the U.S. and abroad.
Brandeis University, PhD in Musicology or Musical Composition and Theory (Waltham, MA): Most of our doctoral students enroll full-time and are funded for five years. Funding includes a full-tuition scholarship, a competitive stipend in return for teaching and/or research, and health insurance benefits.
Cornell University, MFA in Creative Writing (Ithaca, NY): Our small size allows us to offer a generous financial support package that fully funds every student.
New York University, Tisch School of Arts, PhD in Cinema Studies (New York, NY): All Ph.D. students are fully funded by the department for a four-year period.
University of Chicago, PhD in Cinema and Media Studies (Chicago, IL): To be considered for University fellowship support, simply check the appropriate box in the Financial Data section of the online application for admission and you will automatically be considered for all University fellowship funds for which you are eligible.
University of Michigan, MFA in Art & Design (Ann Arbor, MI): Students receive full tuition funding for this unique three-year program.
University of Pittsburgh, PhD in Film Studies (Pittsburgh, PA): PhD students in Film Studies with English as their Associate Department will receive funding through the Department of English.
University of South Carolina, MFA In Creative Writing (Columbia, SC): The MFA at Carolina is pleased to provide fellowship and/or assistantship funding to all accepted students, earning our program the designation of “fully funded” from Poets and Writers.
To view over 500 professional and academic fellowships, including fellowships for graduate and doctoral study and pre- and post-doctoral research, sign up to view ProFellow’s fellowships database.
© Victoria Johnson 2013, all rights reserved.
If you heard Tom McFadden rap on the radio, you might never guess he’s Human Biology graduate from Stanford…unless you listen closely to his lyrics. In an ingenious ploy to get people of all ages more excited about science, Tom raps about all things scientific. It all started while he was a senior at Stanford, when he and fellow Stanford student DJ Derrick Davis decided to rap about the role of gene expression in the process over the beat of Jay-Z’s “Money Ain’t A Thang.” The video of the song “Regulatin’ Genes” became a YouTube sensation, and Tom knew he was on to something. In 2011 he won a Fulbright US Graduate Award to New Zealand to pursue graduate coursework in Science Communication. As part of the New Zealand International Science Festival, Tom visited elementary and middle schools in Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch and Dunedin where he helped Kiwi classrooms turn science into rap. Tom has since returned the San Francisco Bay Area and we caught up with him to learn more about his Fulbright experience and fundraising campaign for Brahe’s Battles, his inspirational new project on Kickstarter.
1. What inspired you to apply to a Fulbright fellowship in New Zealand?
I knew I loved biology and I knew that I loved education. However, neither biological research nor classroom teaching seemed like the ideal fit for my interests and skills after I finished my job as a course associate at Stanford. The University of Otago in Dunedin, New Zealand is one of the few places in the world that offers a broad interdisciplinary course in “science communication.” The Fulbright made it possible for me to travel to New Zealand and spend one year in Otago’s graduate program.
I had sacrificed going abroad as an undergraduate to do neuroscience research. So after college I was eager for the opportunity to be thrown into a totally new environment and new culture and to have to see what I was made of. Getting a postgraduate degree in New Zealand was a way to challenge myself, meet new people, and put myself in a situation where I could grow in new ways.
Tom McFadden with a San Jose classroom of science rappers debating “Is Pluto a planet?”
2. How has the Fulbright experience influenced your long-term goals?
Although I enjoyed making science songs as a biology instructor, my Fulbright experience gave me the tools and freedom to take them to the next level. I was able to make a new set of songs that were better produced, with animations better suited to teaching the content. I was able to think critically about science communication, appreciating the value of incorporating compelling historical stories and human narratives that conveyed scientific process. I was able to work with different groups of kids, conducting qualitative and quantitative research that has informed my current approach. Without the time I spent incubating these ideas during my Fulbright experience, I would have probably moved away from the innovative science education work I’m doing toward a more traditional path. Instead, I am now more fired up than ever about the possibilities ahead.
3. Tell us about your Kickstarter campaign – what do you hope to achieve and how can others support you?
I am helping middle schoolers in urban schools create their own science music videos. Though instead of just rapping about the structure of DNA, James Watson and Rosalind Franklin will be arguing about who deserves credit for which aspects of the discovery. The project is aptly titled “Battle Rap Histories of Epic Science (Brahe’s Battles)” I’ll be doing weekly workshops at five Bay Area schools. We go through all the steps that go into conceiving and producing an educational music video.
If these videos get the production budgets they deserve, then they will spread far and wide and will be used by classrooms throughout the world. They will be watched, remixed, remade, reworked – depending on how much time various science classes have to devote to creative endeavors. It will provide an easy and entertaining way for teachers to open up critical discussions about scientific process, evidence-based argument, and the historical contexts of these discoveries.
But most importantly, it’s a really powerful experience for the kids who get to make the videos. There are so many different skills involved that different kids get to show off their different talents. The project is partially funded by an “Social Innovation grant” from Hewlett Packard and Silicon Valley Education Foundation. However, this only covers one video.
So the Kickstarter campaign is a chance for anybody who cares about science, education, or awesomeness to help support a powerful experience for these kids, which will lead to valuable new tools for science education throughout the world. The deadline to pledge your support (and get cool mixtapes and videos and performances in return) is April 16th!
We backed Tom – you can too! Click here to help him raise $11,865 for Brahe’s Battles by April 16, 2013.
Tom McFadden is a biology educator interested in science-history-music integration. He graduated from Stanford University with a B.A. in Human Biology with a focus in Neuroscience & Behavior. He was born and raised in Sacramento, California where he grew up listening to rappers like Wu-Tang Clan, Outkast, and The Roots. Over the past four years, Tom has traveled to East Palo Alto, Mexico, New Zealand and Japan to help kids create their own science music videos. You can read more at his blog The Rhymebesome.
© Victoria Johnson 2013, all rights reserved.
Here are four more reasons to get excited about attending Boise State University (BSU). The Boise Philharmonic and Boise State Music Department have partnered to create four new full-tuition graduate fellowships for string players pursuing a master of music degree. These new fellowship awards will be added to the existing Graduate Quartet Fellowship for a total of 11 awards.
The Graduate Quartet Fellowships not only pay tuition, fees and a 10,000 USD stipend per year, for two years, but also provide fellows the opportunity to play in the Boise Philharmonic.
“This partnership represents two organizations pooling their resources to strive for excellence. By working together we are ensuring that music in the Treasure Valley will remain vital and thrive for many years to come.” - Boise Philharmonic music director Robert Franz Read more
To be eligible, applicants must be accepted into BSU’s master of music degree program for degrees in performance, pedagogy or education. To learn more about this fellowship please click here.
Don’t miss your chance to apply for the 2012 Artist Trust Fellowship. The Artist Trust Fellowship is a merit based award of $7,500 for talented artists residing in Washington State, USA, working in the disciplines of Craft Arts, Literary Arts, Media Arts and Music Arts. Sixteen awards are up for grabs in 2012.
In addition to the prestige and funding that comes with winning this award, Artist Trust Fellowships also include ‘Meet the Artist’ events which give fellows a unique opportunity to promote themselves and their work in communities and areas currently outside of their reach.
“Meet the Artist is an integral part of the Fellowship Program. Examples of Meet the Artist events include: a public reading, a lecture, a workshop or a performance of the recipient’s work”. Read more.
The application deadline for the 2012 Artist Trust Fellowship is February 26, 2012. To learn more about this and other open fellowship, grant, and funding opportunities with Artist Trust please click here.
Picture from Wikipedia.org
Each year thirty Rome Prize Fellowships are awarded to talented early-to-mid career artists, architects, designers, historians, musicians and scholars to live and work at the American Academy in Rome. The fellowship provides a stipend, meals, a bedroom with private bath, and a study or studio.
The Rome Prize Fellowship accepts applications from a wide array of disciplines including: architecture, design, historic preservation and conservation, landscape architecture, literature, musical composition, visual arts, ancient studies, medieval studies, renaissance and early modern studies and modern Italian studies.
The Rome Prize Fellowship winners are invited to Rome for either 6 or 11 months, provided a stipend of $14,000 or $26,000, respectively, and are provided with a once in a lifetime opportunity to expand their professional, artistic, or scholarly pursuits, drawing on their colleagues’ erudition and experience and on the inestimable resources that Italy, Europe, the Mediterranean, and the Academy have to offer.
To be eligible for the Rome Prize Fellowship you must be a U.S. citizen. Additional eligibility requirements vary by discipline and include things such as years of relevant work experience and post-graduate education. For more information about the Rome Prize Fellowship, please visit the website.
Every year, USA Fellows distributes 50 fellowships worth $50,000 to artists in visual and performing arts, media and literature, who are in any stage of their career. Some of this year’s fellows include Steve James, who directed the 1994 documentary “Hoop Dreams” about the struggle of two black teenagers to become professional basketball players and modern-dance pioneer Donald Byrd, who choreographed “The Color Purple” on Broadway.
According to Bloomberg news, the L.A.-based nonprofit, United States Artists, provides the fellowships to “the most innovative and influential artists” in their field who struggle to maintain a steady income.
“Our staff makes the phone calls to the winners, and sometimes they’re crying or they’ll say, ‘You’ve pulled me back from the edge,’” said Katharine DeShaw, USA’s executive director. “You get a sense that the award is a real life saver.”
Candidates must be nominated by one of eight anonymous discipline-specific peer panels before he or she can submit an application. The Ford, Rockefeller, Prudential and Rasmuson foundations helped set up the artists fellowships in 2005 with $22 million in seed money.
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