Fully Funded Offer and TA-ship Rescinded

[kjgv22]

Hi all, 

Has anyone ever heard of all a fully funded TA-ship being revoked after being offered to a student? I was accepted to Saint Louis University's English PhD program off the waitlist a few weeks ago. I hadn't yet finalized my acceptance with them, because I was waiting to hear back from two other waitlists. Today I received an email from the DGS that stated, due to "unforeseen circumstances" they can no longer fund me or offer me an assistantship. But my offer of admission still stands. (lol) Has anyone ever heard of this happening? Either way, I'll be attending elsewhere, it's just a shame because SLU was absolutely my top choice.

Thanks.

[Warelin]

It's a rare occurrence, but it happens from time to time. It generally occurs when more people than anticipated accept their initial offer. Usually, they move onto the waitlist as a needbe basis. My guess here is that they extended 2 offers for the one waitlist spot guessing that only one would accept. I'm sorry this happened to you though.

[kjgv22]

Thanks @Warelin I was thinking along those lines also. Although, in that case, do you think it would have made a difference if I had accepted my offer earlier? Can't help but wonder about these things.

[Warelin]

It really is hard to say, @kjgv22. It might have. It might have not. Sometimes academic budgets change after application season which also result in a loss of funding for some departments. Sometimes, students take an extra year and get departmental funding which could result in one fewer spot for the upcoming factor. As far as I know, I've never heard of a department retracting a funded offer after the student has accepted it. I think there are conditions in the contract when you accept that protect you against those scenarios. 

[TakeruK]

Sorry to hear about this happening, it is pretty rare though.

Although it may have been true that if you had accepted earlier, you might still have your offer (i.e. when this happens, departments might prioritize those who responded first). But it is definitely possible for students who have accepted and even students who are already attending to suddenly lose funding due to unforeseen circumstances. This is true even if your offer letter said "guaranteed funding". Usually the offer letter always says "subject to availability" and even if they don't, generally unforeseen circumstances will void these guarantees. 

This scenario is obviously very rare and departments will do almost everything they can to ensure their current students are funded, including revoking funding from new students. Another thing I've seen happen is to quickly graduate some students sooner than normal (or a student having to finish sooner or run out of funding). 

So, honestly, don't beat yourself up over not accepting sooner. You may have even dodged a bullet if these funding programs are indicative of the department's general financial health. You may not have the resources you need to do your work there, or even worse, you might lose funding in the middle of your program!