U.S. Graduate engineering students’ perceptions of and strategies towards acquiring external funding for their education

• Autores: Bushra Tawfiq Chowdhury, Aditya Johri
• Localización: The International journal of engineering education, ISSN-e 0949-149X, Vol. 30, no. 5, 2014, págs. 1136-1144
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • Each year a large number of graduate engineering students apply for external funding, primarily from the U.S. National ScienceFoundation (NSF), either directly as fellowships or indirectly as graduate research assistantships. Although pursuing anopportunity at NSF is a challenging and rewarding experience and a much needed skill, we know little about how graduateengineering students approach this process and what leads to success. In this paper we use an interview-based qualitative study tospecifically examine formal versus informal support available to students to apply for funding and the process of applicationsubsequent to students’ decision to pursue a funding opportunity. Our study shows that the pursuit for grants is primarilyencouraged by faculty members and applicants utilize this opportunity to scope one’s research ideas, get a higher stipend, andreduce their dependence on teaching or research assistantships. Moreover, figuring out specific details of the application procedure,writing in a way that is satisfactory to the funding agency, and knowing where and when to apply are among the few of thechallenges engineering graduate students face during the grant application.