PLAN, Manage Your Professional Development as a Graduate Student
Dear Rackham PhD students,
Along with associate deans at Rackham, I have been meeting with many graduate students, faculty, and staff since the Rackham Executive Board approved the continuous enrollment policy in December 2008. The primary goal of the policy is to increase the completion rate among doctoral students at the University. Since the goal is to ensure that graduate students benefit, Rackham has been collaborating with the deans of all the schools and colleges, and faculty around the campus to create the conditions that will support students better.
Since December, we have been planning for implementation of the policy that will take effect in the fall of 2010. I write to share some updates and next steps.
Implementation will occur only after funding for tuition is identified Implementation of the continuous enrollment policy is conditional on the development of funding plans by individual schools and colleges. The intent of the policy is that students who don't pay tuition now should not pay tuition under continuous enrollment. The enrollment of all doctoral students means that candidacy tuition can be lowered, subject to the approval of the Regents. The savings produced by lower candidacy tuition will help fund tuition for those students who will be registered under the new requirement.
The target date for school and college funding plans to be completed is the end of summer 2009. During the Fall 2009 term, schools and colleges will work with departments and graduate programs to clarify how the funding plan will work and how individual programs will be affected. By the end of Fall 2009, graduate programs will know how the school or college plans will fund their students.
The University will pay tuition for students making satisfactory progress to degree, but who would not register under current practices Every school and college will have a different funding plan, but they'll all be designed to achieve the same goal: students who might not have registered under our current practices, but who would be required to register under continuous enrollment, will have their tuition paid by the university. Most schools and colleges plan to create tuition fellowships to support students making satisfactory progress to degree, but who are not otherwise supported. Tuition fellowships will fill the gap between funding already committed to students and funding required under the new policy.
These additional tuition fellowships will not be created by diverting funds currently supporting graduate students. The new tuition fellowships will be created in large part from savings that will be produced by reducing candidacy tuition. The Board of Regents will consider a reduction in candidacy tuition in Spring 2010.
The new tuition-only fellowships will not be part of the full funding packages (including tuition, insurance, and stipend) that many PhD students receive as GSIs, GSRAs, or fellowship recipients. They would be awarded in addition to that funding for those students who need them. For LSA students, tuition-only fellowships will not count toward the ten-term limit on LSA support.
Students making satisfactory progress to degree will be eligible for tuition support. Satisfactory progress toward the degree is defined by individual graduate programs. It will not mean the same thing for every graduate program, nor does satisfactory progress mean the same thing for every student in a given program. Individual circumstances affect the pace at which students can work, and graduate program faculty are best qualified to make decisions about students' progress.
The policy will be monitored for unanticipated negative impact on students or graduate programs. Any policy can have unintended effects, and since our goal is to benefit all students, we will step in immediately if we discover that the policy's implementation is having negative effects on students as a whole or on particular groups of students. We did a careful feasibility study at the earliest stages of considering continuous enrollment-could we make it possible for all students to register every fall and winter without putting the financial burden for tuition on the student or on the graduate program? We found that with savings from a reduced candidacy tuition rate, along with additional resources from the Provost and from Rackham for some schools and colleges, this could be achieved. And the funding plans now being developed will put this research into effect.
Without workable plans for schools and colleges to pay tuition for students who are making satisfactory progress to degree and who are not registered under current practices, the continuous enrollment policy will not be implemented. Rackham continues to work carefully with schools and colleges to be sure that in the new economic environment we can implement the continuous enrollment policy without increasing students' financial burden.
We will closely monitor the effect of the policy on students and on graduate programs, and the policy will be reviewed every year to be sure that adequate financial support is in place for students. Consultation with students, through Rackham Student Government, through Students of Color of Rackham, and through Graduate Student Forum, will remain part of our monitoring process.
If we find that the implementation of the continuous enrollment policy has an unanticipated negative impact on students, we are prepared to alter or, if necessary, to roll back the policy. For more information on the continuous enrollment policy or for questions, please see the Rackham website: http://www.rackham.umich.edu/policies/continuous_enrollment/ or e-mail to the Dean's Office.
