Funding Opportunities

Fellowships and Assistantships

The Graduate School at MSU offers fellowship programs that provide financial support for outstanding students who plan to enroll in a doctoral program. In assisting MSU achieve its educational mission, our goal is to foster an intellectually vital and diverse educational community that will prepare graduate students to assume their professional roles in a diverse society. The fellowship packages are worth approximately $100,000 in tuition, stipend, assistantships, and insurance over four years.

Applicants to our program with exceptional GPAs and strong GRE scores (>80th percentile) have competed well for these fellowships in recent years.

Applicants who would like to be considered for multi-year University and College Fellowships are encouraged to submit their applications earlier than the December 1 deadline, preferably by November 15. For more information about the fellowship programs, visit: http://www.grad.msu.edu/fellowships/. Any questions related to fellowship nomination decisions may be directed to Dr. John Carlson at carlsoj@msu.edu.

For those doctoral students that do not receive fellowship supports, it is typical that four years of 50% time (20 hours per week) teaching assistantship is provided which covers tuition and a bi-weekly stipend. The Counseling, Educational Psychology, and Special Education department, in collaboration with the School Psychology Program Director, make these assistantship assignments just prior to the start of the fall semester. Specialist students are typically not eligible for assistantships.

Significant funding packages are also available to outstanding students from traditionally underrepresented groups in the profession. The MSU School Psychology Program is deeply committed to promoting students' multicultural competence, to enhancing diversity within the profession, and to educating scholars and practitioners from traditionally underrepresented groups.

In collaboration with The Graduate School, the College of Education hosts the Advance to Adventure conference to recruit potential graduate students whose enrollment will enhance the educational diversity of the College of Education student body. Consideration is given to applicants based on personal history and experience, research goals, or the promotion of understanding among persons of different backgrounds and ideas. Additionally, attention is given to those who have demonstrated significant academic achievement by overcoming barriers such as economic, social, or educational disadvantage. In particular, this effort within the College of Education is designed to assist our graduate programs in attracting a cohort of diverse students who have traditionally not participated in graduate programs in their units. The MSU school psychology program plans to invite one or two applicants to attend this conference in January with all expenses covered.

Project S-PEC

The School Psychology program has received a four-year training grant from the US Department of Education ($800,000) to carry out our project titled: “Bringing Science into Practice within the delivery of psychological services to Early Childhood populations (Project S-PEC).” Fellowship funding (up to $11,000 in their first year) is available to students who enroll in the program beginning in the Fall of 2012. The school psychology program is looking to add approximately 10 fellows to the project for the 2012-2013 year and will be considering both Ed.S. and Ph.D. applicants.

The fellowship support from this grant will provide an opportunity for students to engage in the integration of science and practice around issues important to early childhood mental health during their first year in the program. In addition to fellowship support, (a) support will be available to attend a national conference pertaining to Head Start Research, (b) a research stipend will be available to conduct research (Ph.D. students) around issues important to the practice of school psychology within early childhood settings, and (c) mileage reimbursement for early childhood practicum placements (a half a day a week in the first year) will be provided. To be eligible for funding, students must sign a service agreement form (upon admission to the program) indicating that they will provide services within the field of school psychology for at least two years for every year that funding is received.