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Campaign for Rackham: Our Graduates Make a Difference

A Message from Janet A. Weiss, Dean and Vice Provost

Janet A. WeissAt the University of Michigan Rackham Graduate School, the paths of alumni, faculty, staff, friends, and current graduate students begin and still converge. Since conferring its first doctoral degree in 1876, the University of Michigan has advanced the value of graduate education in meeting society's needs. We have used our individual skills and training to mentor, teach, inspire, discover, invent and lead as we transform our global community in thousands of ways throughout the world.

In 1935, Mary Rackham worked with President Ruthven to endow the Graduate School with the means to support graduate education at Michigan. Today, we are housed in the magnificent and recently restored Rackham Building and joined by the rigors of academic pursuits in over 120 graduate programs across the depth and breadth of the University. Our heritage of excellence continues to draw exceptional faculty and graduate students from around the world to the University of Michigan, and each year the process of training future citizen-scholars begins anew.

The Rackham Graduate School provides funding for graduate students, departments, and programs at the University of Michigan; information and services related to admissions, orientation and degree requirements; workshops to help graduate students succeed in their programs; student honors and awards; and a national platform to help shape public debate about graduate education.

Support of Graduate Studies

The Rackham Graduate School has changed dramatically since our founding in 1935, although, we remain the largest single source of graduate student financial aid. Almost two-thirds of our annual budget is designated for student support, a critical source of fellowships and grants for nearly 7,000 students. We are committed to recruiting and retaining the best-qualified students from diverse communities in the US and abroad, and financial aid is an important tool in that effort. Our ability to continue to attract the best and brightest to Michigan increasingly depends upon our ability to compete with our peer institutions in terms of fellowship and support.

In addition, the way in which we support and nurture graduate students and programs has evolved beyond financial aid. We offer services and programs that enrich graduate students' experiences. Cutting-edge interdisciplinarity is given a home through over 35 Rackham Interdepartmental Programs, such as Neuroscience and Classical Art & Archaeology. A range of publications, including "How to Get the Mentoring You Want" and "The Dissertation Handbook" are in demand by our students and by other universities. We recognize and honor student recipients of Outstanding Graduate Student Instructor Awards, Distinguished Dissertation Awards and Rackham Predoctoral Fellowships. Rackham Student Government, Rackham Students of Color and the Graduate Student Forum provide a proactive way for graduate students to have a voice and create change. Through participation in the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation's Kalamazoo-Oberlin Exchange, newly minted PhD students gain valuable teaching experience by exchanging places for a year with senior faculty at a nearby liberal arts college.

Leadership in Graduate Education

Nationally, Rackham is recognized as a leader in the growing and exciting dialogue regarding the future of graduate education. We worked with the National Research Council to define the methodology for their upcoming assessment of all graduate programs in the US. We have worked with our colleagues at the American Council on Education, the American Association of Universities, and the Council of Graduate Schools to provide testimony to Congress on the importance of federal support for graduate education. Perhaps the most provocative discussion about graduate education has taken place inside the Responsive PhD Project. A consortium of fourteen top research universities, including the University of Michigan, the Responsive PhD addresses the discrepancies between the kinds of training graduate students receive and the careers available to them. Among the consortium's recommendations are new paradigms for training citizen-scholars to reach their full potential for social good and throughout all areas of study.

Our Graduates Make the Difference

On May 2004, the University of Michigan launched The Michigan Difference campaign.

What the future can bring depends on the type of rigorous intellectual training that takes place every day within Rackham's graduate programs. The future needs our students, researchers and scholars who right now are hard at work on our campus and around the world. The future needs their discoveries, their intellectual curiosity, their skills, their energy, their initiative and, ultimately, their leadership. Above all, Rackham needs the continuing involvement of our community of alumni and friends in sustaining the work of this next generation of scholars. The value and stature of a great public research university is centered in the quality of its graduate programs and the creativity of its faculty and graduate student synergy. Our campaign will focus on this value and this difference that define Rackham. As part of the Rackham community, we invite you to explore ways in which your participation in this campaign can make a difference for individual graduate students, for the strength of graduate programs, for the University of Michigan, and for our future.