It occurred to me that I haven’t posted recently about the vocabulary universities use while discussing admissions to a graduate program. Here are a few:
Admissions process – this is the process to get you admitted to a university. The process is different at every university and often between departments. This process usually means filling out one or more online applications, having transcripts sent to each school, reference letters written about you and sent, paying an application fee, taking the GRE test and having scores sent to each school to which you apply, and any other information a school might require. Our application process is described here.
Matriculation – actually attending school, going to classes. Having been admitted to a college or university.
Degree seeking – you can attend college and just take a course or two and not be degree seeking. Or you can have a degree program (MS or PhD) which you seek.
Degree granting: PSP is not a degree granting program. We have students do rotations if they choose, but the student is either admitted to the Agronomy department or the School of Biological Sciences through our program.
Stipend – the money we pay you to attend graduate school.
Fellowships – students sometimes are awarded a fellowship. This is money that has no official work associated with it. Often fellowships do not have a tuition waiver associated with it so students sometimes will be billed for tuition. Schools sometimes have other awards associated with a fellowship, so tuition will be waived. This is something you need to consider when you accept a fellowship.
Research assistantship (RA) – this is money you receive that has some form of work associated with it. Initially, rotations are the “work” associated with the stipend. Afterwords, the research you do in a lab is the “work”.
Teaching assistantship (TA) – this is money you receive to be a TA, a teaching assistant for a course in a department. These usually have tuition waivers associated with them as well.
Rotation – You do smaller research projects in different labs to see the kind of research that you like. Usually completed the first semester of your first year. This is an excellent opportunity because it allows you to check out different departments, to see where your interests lay and to check out different faculty. You can discover the best fit for yourself.
Tuition waiver – a tuition waiver is having your tuition paid by the institution. When you receive an assistantship, like our program provides, your tuition is removed. Some schools offer partial waiver, others full. We provide a full waiver.
