UW-Madison Department of Geoscience

Graduate Funding
The Department of Geoscience provides guaranteed support in the form of fellowships, research assistantships, project assistantships, or teaching assistantships to those students who successfully compete in a selection process that occurs early every spring semester. Complete Guaranteed Support Document

For students coming to Madison with an undergraduate degree, the guarantee is for eight (8) semesters if the student intends to stay through the Ph.D, or for four (4) semesters towards the M.S. If the student already has an M.S. degree from another university, we guarantee a total of six (6) semesters of support for work toward a Ph.D. Outstanding applicants are also eligible for consideration for departmental support as a Weeks RA, which provides one year of funding in addition to the semesters included in the four to eight semesters of the Department's guarantee. Support in the form of semester or year-long appointments as research, project, or teaching assistantships may also be available to those not receiving a long term guarantee.

The majority of students hold a teaching assistantship (TA) or a research assistantship (RA) funded by research grants. In addition the department awards a number of prestigious Weeks Research Assistantships to incoming graduate students with exceptionally strong records.

The department pleased to announce the availability of a new program of graduate research assistantships (BP-RA) , funded by BP. These will be awarded based on a combination of outstanding academic credentials and industry-oriented career plans.
http://www.geology.wisc.edu/prospective_stu/bp_ra/

The department and BP are pleased to announce the third year of a Research Assistantship that is aimed at students from cultural and ethnic groups who are under-represented in the earth sciences.
http://www.geology.wisc.edu/misc/diversity.html

Costs and Funding information from the UW-Madison Graduate School.

Students are encouraged to gain experience in seeking external funding for their summer research and field work through various agencies who fund graduate student research. Some sources of external funding:

National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Program
http://www.ehr.nsf.gov/dge/programs/grf

Hertz Foundation Fellowships in the Applied Physical Sciences
http://www.hertzfoundation.org/

Minorities and Women in the Physical Sciences
http://www.npsc.org/

AAPG Grants in Aid Program
http://foundation.aapg.org/gia/index.cfm

Geological Society of America Grants for Graduate Students
http://www.geosociety.org/grants/

Sigma Xi Grants in Aid of Research
http://www.sigmaxi.org/resources/student/index.shtml