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University of Wisconsin – Madison

Current Graduate Student Funding

This page details available sources of support or tools for finding funding appropriate for your program level and research interests. The first section has links to sources of Departmental funding. The second section points to a variety of UW-Madison sources of funding, and the third offers information on external funding. Regardless of your funding status, we strongly encourage all students to explore all sources of support.

Departmental Funding

PhD at Spring Commencement
  • Graduate Assistantships: All graduate students who are on guarantee will be offered a Teaching Assistant (TA) or Project Assistant (PA) position in the Department unless they have secured a graduate-benefits-eligible position (such as a fellowship, TA, PA, or RA) elsewhere on campus. TAs, PAs, and RAs enrolled for at least 6 graduate credits with a 33.4% appointment are considered full-time by the registrar but not by the Graduate School for earning full weeks of residence. Those enrolled for at least 4 graduate credits with a 50% appointment are considered full-time by the registrar but not by the Graduate School. To learn more about full-time standing, please check out Graduate School Enrollment Requirements.
  • Student Travel Grants: Applications are due May 1st every year. The call goes out in early March. Travel grants are available to graduate students in the Department who have attended/will attend a conference in a given fiscal year. The amounts awarded will depend upon the number of appropriately-documented requests submitted, with a maximum award of $250.

UW-Madison Sources of Funding

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Available to All Graduate Students

  • Nave Field Research Grants The Department of Latin American, Caribbean, and Iberian Studies (LACIS) uses this fellowship to support graduate students who wish to pursue short-term research in Latin America, the Caribbean, and the Iberian Peninsula. All graduate students in all UW-Madison departments are eligible. Application deadline is usually in early March. Graduate students apply directly to this fellowship.
  • The International Division’s International Fellowships Office A resource center for information on funding opportunities such as the Foreign Language Area Studies (FLAS) which has both an academic year fellowship and a summer fellowship,  and the IRIS Graduate Student Summer Fieldwork Award. Both fellowships are available to any level of graduate student. FLAS applicants must be U.S. Citizens or Permanent Residents.  Graduate students apply directly to these two fellowships.
  • Graduate Public Humanities Exchange (HEX) The HEX program is a long-running and dynamic program that funds innovative public humanities projects that forge partnerships between community organizations and graduate students. The application process opens in November and closes February 1st. Graduate students apply directly to the program.

Available to Dissertators

  • Dana-Allen Dissertation Fellowship UW-Madison Dissertation Fellowship. The fellowship is open to PhD students in the humanities or in the humanistically-oriented social sciences; candidates may be from any college or school at UW-Madison. Nominees must have had their dissertation proposals accepted and should have written at least one chapter of the dissertation. Applications are by Departmental nomination only. The Departmental call for applicants is usually in the middle of the fall semester before, and applications are due in late January.
  • Mellon Public Humanities Graduate Fellowships This competition is open to students in the humanities and related fields who are currently writing dissertations. This fellowship provides graduate students in the humanities with professional experience outside of academia. By placing fellows in partner organizations around Madison including museums, hospitals, non-profits, community centers, and emerging businesses, the program facilitates the reciprocal sharing of resources and expertise, and highlights the significance of the humanities both on and off campus. Graduate students apply directly to this fellowship.
  • Mellon-WI Summer Fellowship This fellowship supports dissertators in the College of Letters and Science conducting research in the humanities or humanistic social sciences. Graduate students apply directly to the Graduate School for these fellowships.

External Funding

  • Ford Foundation Fellowship Program The Ford Foundation seeks to increase the diversity of the nation’s college and university faculties by increasing their ethnic and racial diversity, to maximize the educational benefits of diversity, and to increase the number of professors who can and will use diversity as a resource for enriching the education of all students. Awards will be made for study in research-based Ph.D. or Sc.D. programs. Prospective applicants should read carefully the eligibility requirements, the terms of the fellowship awards, application instructions and other information pertaining to the individual fellowship (Predoctoral, Dissertation, or Postdoctoral) for which they are applying.
  • The American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) provides numerous competitions and fellowships, some of which partner with the A.W. Mellon Foundation and some of which do not.
  • We strongly recommend that you also visit the UW’s Grants Information Collection for a comprehensive database of available resources.
  • See “International Student Services” under Available to All Graduate Students above.