Financial Aid
The University's Office of Student Financial Services estimates other expenses (housing, food, other educational and incidental expenses) to exceed $1000 a month. See the Graduate School's site Funding Your Graduate Education.
A. Departmental support
Criteria for awarding financial aid
Unfortunately departmental resources for supporting graduate students are limited. Not all deserving students can be supported. Departmental financial awards are made to the basis of the following three criteria:- Academic merit: Attracting good students to the program and retaining them.
- Professional promise: Providing our students with practical training for a future career.
- Subordinate to the first two criteria is that of utility: serving departmental staffing needs in the language teaching program.
- The three major fields of study offered by the department.
- Continuing versus in-coming students.
- Distributing teaching experience among eligible and promising students.
Financial aid administered by the Department
a. Graduate Assistantships
The Slavic Department has a limited number of part-time staff positions for graduate students as Graduate Assistants (commonly referred to as "RA's") and Teaching Assistants ("TA's").
- Duties and benefits of Graduate Assistants. An RA performs various non-instructional duties assigned by the department. A TA assists a faculty member in the instructional program, but is not permitted to conduct regular classroom instruction. TA's and RA's are appointed as University employees, entitling them to certain benefits, including the right to pay tuition and fees at the in-state rate.
- Qualifications and conditions. An RA or TA must have been admitted to the Graduate School without conditions or deficiencies, must be in good academic standing (GPA > 3.0), and must be making satisfactory progress toward the degree (with no more than one grade of Incomplete from the previous semester or summer term). International students are qualified for 'student contact' only on earning English language certification through the UT Austin International Office; the graduate adviser can provide details. During each semester of the appointment, the RA or TA must be registered for at least nine semester hours of courses.
b. Assistant Instructorships
An Assistant Instructor (AI) is an auxiliary member of the teaching staff employed to meet undergraduate instructional needs, primarily in lower-division areas. An AI must hold a master's degree or its equivalent, have EITHER earned credit for Russian 398T ("Supervised Teaching in Russian: Principles and Methods of Teaching Russian") and have one semester experience as a TA OR or have one year of appropriate teaching experience; in addition, the qualifications and conditions imposed on Graduate Assistants listed above must be satisfied. Therefore, students entering the Master's program are rarely eligible for appointment as AI's.
c. University 'Preemptive' Fellowships
While funded and administered by the Graduate School, the Department nominates candidates for these prestigious fellowships, which impose no duties on the recipient. Students can be offered a one-year (nine-months) preemptive fellowship or a fellowship/assistantship package (for two years, or, in very rare cases, five years). A student ranked in the top ten percent of the national applicant pool in the field is eligible to be nominated. Nominees typically have a combined (Verbal plus Quantitative) GRE score over 1400, along with a strong academic record in other indicators of probable success in graduate studies. Entering students are eligible for "pre-emptive" fellowships; after the first year, students with an outstanding record are eligible for "continuing" fellowships.
Applying for financial aid.
There is a single application procedure for all three forms of departmental support. In-coming students must complete item 8 on page 3 of the "Application for Admission to Graduate Study" and submitting the following documentation to the Graduate Adviser, Department of Slavic Languages by February 1:
- a "Personal Statement" form (contained in the Bulletin)
- a complete set of transcripts of your previous academic work, in addition to that submitted for admission; an unofficial transcript is sufficient for this purpose
- three letters of reference (forms contained in the Bulletin; to be submitted directly by those writing the letters)
B. Office of Student Financial Services (OSFS)
Office: Student Services Building 3.200
100 West Dean Keeton Street
Campus mail code: E3700
Mail: P. O. Box 7758
Austin, TX 78713-7758
Telephone: (512) 475-6282
Fax: (512) 475-6296
E-mail: finaid@www.utexas.edu
UT Office of Student Financial Services
Request their Application Guide: Steps to Financing Your Education. You will need to complete a Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA). While their resources are limited and they receive many applications, you may get some assistance in one or more of several forms Students who apply for financial aid using the FAFSA are eligible for all federal, state, and institutional financial aid programs offered by the OSFS, except the Federal Pell Grant. These include:
- Gift aid: state and institutional grant or scholarship funds
- Self-help aid: student loans, both need-based and non-need-based. Most graduate students will be eligible for student loans through the Federal Family Educational Loan Program (FFELP).
In addition, the Office of Student Financial Services is authorized to grant interest-free short-term loans for emergency or tuition assistance purposes. Such loans could be useful if you are expecting money which has not arrived when you need it.
C. Other sources of support
The OSFS can assist you in searching for other private foundations and government agencies which offer a multitude of fellowship, grant, and loan funds to help you finance your graduate education. In addition to their own web page, they recommend The Financial Aid Page, maintained by M. Kantrowitz. The graduate advisor makes such relevant sources known to students in residence, primarily by posting notices on the Graduate Program bulletin board.
