Which MA Programs in Philosophy Fund Students?
As some of you know, Geoff Pynn (Northern Illinois) has over the years provided an important service to the philosophy profession: maintaining a list of master’s programs in philosophy and the kind of funding they offer their students. The list now includes 31 U.S. MA programs:
- Brandeis
- Cal State Los Angeles
- Colorado State
- Florida State
- Georgia State
- George Washington
- Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis
- Kent State
- Miami University (Ohio)
- Michigan State
- Northern Illinois
- Ohio University
- Oklahoma State
- San Francisco State
- Southern Illinois – Carbondale
- Texas A&M
- Texas State
- Texas Tech
- Tufts
- U. Arkansas
- U. Florida
- U. Houston
- U. Georgia
- U. Memphis
- U. Missouri – St. Louis
- U. Mississippi
- U. Texas – San Antonio
- U. Wisconsin – Milwaukee
- U. Wyoming
- Virginia Tech
- Western Michigan
And 12 Canadian ones:
- Carleton
- Dalhousie
- McMaster
- Ryerson
- Simon Fraser
- U. Alberta
- U. British Columbia
- U. Calgary
- U. Toronto
- U. Victoria
- U. Windsor
- York
See the whole list for funding details on the various schools. And if your program is not included, please mention it in the comments and contact Professor Pynn with the information he’ll need to update the list.
The University of Essex in the UK usually has several tuition fees scholarships for Philosophy MA students each year. Also there are various jobs available to help with the maintenance. Worth noting there is a good SWIP chapter here too.
I do not know about other UK departments but think MA funding is fairly rare at least.
The list I came up with is limited to US and Canadian programs. That’s simply because my “methodology” was to go to the websites of departments listed in the APA Guide to Graduate Programs as offering terminal MAs, and copy whatever info I could find there — but that Guide only covers the US and Canada. It would be great to be able to publicize the same info about UK programs.
University of Oklahoma
Thanks, I’ve added Oklahoma to the list.
University of Western Ontario funds both international students, and Canadian students in their MA program
Thanks. I don’t see any info about funding on the UWO department’s website, though. If somebody from the department emails me with funding information, I’ll add it to the list.
At Carnegie Mellon University, we provide a 1/2 tuition scholarship to all MA/MS students. In addition, we often hire them as graders, although this is not guaranteed.
A great service. Thanks for maintaining this list, Geoff.
Thanks Kevin! I found CMU’s funding info on the website and added it to the list.
The University of Kansas funds students admitted to its MA program, and we make no distinction between Ph.D. and MA students when it comes to funding decisions.
Thanks Dale, I’ve added this blurb to the sheet. If there is a place with any more detailed funding information on the website, I can add something more specific.
The Central European University in Budapest offers a number of one or two year MA scholarships that include tuition fee waiver, accommodation and a stipend. The degree has dual accreditation: Budapest and New York. All courses at the university are in English.
Queen’s too.
Thanks, I added info about Queen’s.
Loyola Marymount University has an MA program in philosophy, with a very good PhD program placement rate. We offer partial funding for at least some (not sure about the percentage of students receiving funding or the typical award amount).
Thanks, Tom, I added LMU’s program to the list. (From the website: “The Department awards one Graduate Assistantship each year. An assistantship is awarded for a two-year period. In addition, Graduate Grants, ranging from one-quarter to one-half tuition, are awarded by the Department. Currently, every student enrolled in the program is receiving significant financial assistance.”)
An added note: students don’t need to be Canadian in order to attend, and be fully funded at, Canadian MA programs.
A plug for our program: SFU has full funding for MA students, through fellowships, teaching assistantships, and research assistantships. This means 100% tuition plus a living stipend, for the length of the program. We also have travel funding for MA students. And, what is often reckoned to be the best departmental view in any North American Philosophy department (edging out even UCSD).
Many Canadian MA programs fund their students about as much as the PhD students. The University of Calgary certainly does. I can’t speak for other programs, but we don’t discriminate against non-Canadians in the application process.
Thanks for this from both of you. I changed the wording on the document to try to block the misleading implicature that non-Canadian students are at a general disadvantage when it comes to receiving funding at Canadian MA programs. Moreover as it was pointed out to me, it’s also true at some US programs that non-citizens have a harder time getting funded.
Thanks for putting this together, Geoff. It’s a great resource.
Thanks for putting this information together and for making it publicly available. It is really helpful! I am wondering if there is any information available on schools that offer application fee waivers for applicants with need. A couple of students have asked me this question recently and I assumed that more schools provided those waivers than it seems to be the case.
Hi Ariela, I don’t know about any general sources of information about that. At NIU, any student who qualifies for a GRE fee reduction can have their application fee waived. Here is the ETS website that tells you about the GRE fee reduction program: https://www.ets.org/gre/subject/about/fees/reduction/
Thanks, Geoff, that’s good to know and I’ll pass that info on. I couldn’t find the info on the NIU website (maybe I just missed it) which makes me think that perhaps other schools offer such waivers even if they are not listed in the website…
Yeah you’re right — in order to find that out you have to dig deep in the university’s Graduate Catalog. We should put it on our department website. At most places, applications are not handled by the department directly, so it takes some bureaucratic experience to know about the ins and outs of things like application fees and deadlines. I’ll bet lots of departmental graduate directors simply don’t know whether application fees can be reduced or waived. I didn’t until an applicant asked me about it, prompting me to do some research and find out.
The MA program at the University of Toledo offers full tuition waivers and stipends. Geoff — I’ll email you directly with a link to the webpage. Thank you for maintaining the list publicly.
Thanks Ben, I updated the list to include Toledo.
The Loyola Marymount MA Program in Philosophy provides funding for every student, ranging from 1/2 to full tuition. It also awards Research Assistantships and Teaching Fellowships. For the 14 years of its existence, the placement rate for students who seek entry into PhD programs is 90%.
Thanks Mark, I updated the list to include Loyola Marymount’s program and funding information from the department website. However the funding info on the website (http://bellarmine.lmu.edu/philosophy/graduateprogram/financialaid/) is slightly different from what you’ve posted here.
Hello Geoff,
I am the graduate advisor for University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. I was wondering if we could add some more information about our financial support to your spreadsheet. We usually admit about 9 students with TA positions each year and have a total of about 18 such positions. We also apply for, and usually get, Chancellor’s Awards for each of our funded entering students. This is a one time award of around $1000-$1200 for students from the United States and about $2000 for international students. This is meant to help offset the costs of their initial move to Milwaukee. All of our TA positions receive the salaries noted on your spreadsheet and, in addition to those salaries, recieve tuition waivers and health insurance.
There are a few competitive university wide fellowships that we regularly nominate students for as well. If we have a candidate who meets the criteria, we nominate that candidate for an Advanced Opportunity Program Fellowship, which remits all tuition and includes a stipend of $15,000. We nominate two of our students each year for a Distinguished Graduate Student Fellowship (DGSF). This is a fellowship that is usually awarded to students going into their second year. It also remits all tuition and includes a stipend of $15,000. We have had a strong track record of securing the DGSF in particular. Over the past 12 years we have averaged about 1/year and have often secured 2 in a year.
We sometimes admit a student or two without funding. When a student is admitted without funding and comes from out of state, we apply for (and usually get) a Non-Resident Tuition Remission Scholarship. We try to secure funded positions for unfunded students for their second year. But, I’d like to emphasize that we usually have 18 funded positions (9/year) and almost all of our students have one of those positions. Those who are admitted without funding are very few.
Our website includes some information about all of these fellowships and scholarships: http://uwm.edu/philosophy/graduate/financial-assistance/
I completed my MA in Philosophy at New York University in 2013, and so I thought it might be helpful to share my experience. The MA at NYU is typically a two year program. The Philosophy Department (by way of the School of Arts and Sciences, I believe) awarded me tuition remission which erased half of my tuition fees. Also, because I had received additional external merit-based scholarships, I was eligible to apply for a great program called the NYU Tuition Incentive Program, which contributed a matching value of my external scholarship towards tuition. A few caveats: I don’t know whether these awards continue to be available. It was my understanding that these awards were at least partly merit based and limited in quantity, and so they may not be available for all MA students, or in every instance. It is worth keeping in mind that NYU typically has a very small MA cohort—I was one of three students in my year. The administrators—and the professors—are generally incredibly helpful and informative, so it’s worth following up with them about your eligibility for these awards if you are considering NYU.
University of Montana
“The Department awards a limited number of teaching assistantships to qualified students focusing on environmental philosophy, except in rare instances. These carry a stipend of about $9,000 and a tuition waiver. You must indicate on your application that you wish to be considered for a teaching assistantship.”
http://hs.umt.edu/philosophy/graduate/environmental-emphasis/egrad-funding.php
Thanks Jake, I’ve added Montana and the funding info to the list.
LSU has an MA program that fully funds about half a dozen graduate students. The funding includes a stipend of just over 10k per academic year, plus a full tuition waiver (students are expected to pay fees, however).
Louisiana State University (following what AnonGrad just added)
The Philosophy MA at LSU currently offers five graduate assistantships total (either 2 or 3 are awarded the assistantships in each class). We offer a stipend of 12k per academic year for two years (this has recently increased from 10k), and a full tuition waiver.
http://www.lsu.edu/hss/prs/graduate.php
At UNC Charlotte, we provide some funding for more than half of our MA students, and the university has just instituted tuition awards based on need (via FAFSA form). Those are not in the control of the department, but we encourage our students to fill out FAFSAs so that they can be considered. We haven’t posted on our web site because the amount and source is somewhat variable from year to year. Thanks so much for your time compiling this helpful list!
University of Toledo, OH. Highly recommended. Full tuition waiver, modest stipend (8k a year I think). Student is responsible for some fees (around 2k first semester, 1k following semesters, less if the student has health insurance via another source than UT) and will need to supplement the stipend to cover the cost of living. But a great place to do an MA nonetheless.
Louisiana State University