Types of Assistance

Assistantship is the most common type of financial aid specifically for aspiring international students who want to postgraduate degree. Postgraduate international students must specify their financial aid requirements at the time of filling the application form. Typically, different types of assistantship are awarded in various forms based on the merits. Different types of assistantships are available as follows.

Tuition Waiver:

Tuition Waiver means the student need not have to pay the tuition fees at the university. Depending on the university tuition fees may be partially or fully waived. However, the student has to pay for using extra facility fees available at the university campus like library, computers and sports and health services. A tuition waiver is often granted in combination with a scholarship or teaching or research assistantship.

Scholarship/Fellowship/Grants:

Scholarship/Fellowship/Grants is usually an absolute grant which is based on the student’s ability and performance in their academic sessions. Hence, only an honest outstanding student may be considered to award this financial aid prior to getting admission at the university. In this type of aid the student does not have any repayment obligations or provide any kind of services to the university. Full Scholarship is awarded to the students to carry out complete living expenses at the university whereas partial scholarship is awarded to wherein student has to bear expenses other than tuition fees.

Assistantship:

Assistantship is again the financial aid provided by university which is in the form of cash stipend against the assistantship services provided by the student. The student have to work for maximum 20 hours in a week for which he is given a stipend that is sufficient to bear living expenses.

Following are the main types of assistantship that are available to the international students:

Graduate Assistantship (GA):
The student will be working in the departmental laboratory usually software development, maintenance and support.

Teaching Assistantship (TA):
The student may be asked to assist the professor in teaching or grading. You may occasionally teach an undergraduate course. You may require taking Test of Spoken English which is commonly known as TSE to qualify yourself for a teaching assistantship. Research Assistantship (RA): The student is granted this aid by the department of the university. The student has to work with the professor for which he may assign the research based task to the student.

Administrative Internships:

This aid is very similar to assistantship. The students availing this aid are expected to work part time assisting administrative officers in the university.

These aids are given to the students who have additional abilities in the respective areas of expertise. And hence it is given to the students who are master or doctoral level of students who can teach undergraduate students or assist the professors in their research.

Note: Typically, the students who start out as Teaching Assistant or Graduate Assistant assisting a professor may be supported or referred you to the professor who might help you out funding Research Assistantship when you select your major. These assistantships require you to work 16 to 20 hours per week on an average.