Summer Funding

[DeeLovely79]

Hi Everyone,

I have question regarding funding offers. I am in the fortunate position of having atleast two schools do decide between. Neither at this point is offering a package that includes summer funding. Is this something I should be negotiating? I'm not 100% sure this is something standard in my field but both of my schools are working hard to get me? Would it be to much to trying and get some type of guarantee for an assistantship/TA position during the summer?

I'm currently a working in my field with no outside support so it's not a realistic expectation for me to "go home" for the summer and do feel like I need to be engaged in some type of paid career activity over the summer for in order to progress in my field and keep my bank account from going into the red.

Any thoughts on how I should approach this topic?

[long_time_lurker]

For this summer one would think you will keep your current job so I will confine my response to the subsequent summers. I can also only speak definitively about my school and reasonably well about the ones I decided not to attend..

Funding packages are usually academic year (i.e. 9/10 months) unless explicitly stated. You're either going to have to be funded by a P.I. to get a 12 month grant as then you're going to be working on his/her project (projects don't "take off for the summer") or you're going to have to go somewhere that has plenty of TA assignments in the summer. At my school, there's not much in the way of summer courses but on the other hand enough folks don't stick around that although the assistantships are awarded on a competitive basis, most people who applied got what they wanted/needed. I think what you'll want to do is make sure the school you select has enough courses to go around in the summer to at least make it probable that you will get funded in the summer. If the school is not forthcoming with the info you can always get it from the current students.

Another thing worth considering is going to a place that has a good enough job market that you will be able to pick up a job when May rolls around, whether it's in or out of your field. I can tell you I've been offered summer work and others in my cohort and department have work lined up both in or close to our field and out (e.g. bartending) and have even been able to turn employers down. This seems to be location specific though as the economic recovery is going strong in some locales and is nonexistent in others.