Departmental Dissertation Fellowship Policy

The Dissertation Fellowship is an additional year of funding provided on a competitive basis by the Dean of the Graduate School with departmental recommendation, after the fifth year of departmental teaching assistantship for students who do the M.A. here or after the fourth year for students who enter with a Master's from another institution. This fellowship is intended to provide students with an extra year of funding in which to write intensively and to finish the doctorate, free from teaching obligations.

GRADUATE STUDENTS ON A DISSERTATION FELLOWSHIP ARE EXPECTED TO BE IN RESIDENCE IN ST. LOUIS AND TO FULLFILL ALL DEPARTMENTAL OBLIGATIONS, INCLUDING PARTICIPATION IN LECTURES, WORKSHOPS, AND THE LIKE. HOWEVER, RESEARCH-RELATED TRIPS, USUALLY OF NO MORE THAN 2-3 MONTHS IN DURATION, MAY BE TAKEN DURING THIS TIME WITH THE PERMISSION OF THE DEPARTMENT AND THE GRADUATE SCHOOL.

Application for the Dissertation Fellowship

The application and all supporting materials, including your advisor's letter, must be delivered to the Department Chair by the February 20 deadline; otherwise, your application will not be considered. The Dissertation Fellowship application form and all supporting materials must be presented in English.

Forms

1. A student must file the Dissertation Scope form with the Graduate School prior to applying for the Dissertation Fellowship. This form establishes one's status as an ABD, the Graduate School's first requirement in considering students for the Dissertation Fellowship award.
2. A student must write a one-page description of the planned chapters of the dissertation, submit it to his/her director for approval, and turn in a final copy to the Chair by February 20.
3. The dissertation director must write a one-page letter verifying the student's progress in writing the first and any other chapter(s) and her/his committee's approval of the application for the Dissertation Fellowship, and give it to the Chair by February 20.
4. The Chair signs the Dissertation Fellowship Certification Form, filled out by each applicant, combines it with numbers 2 and 3, adds a departmental letter of support, and sends the materials for each student to the Graduate School prior to March 1. Note that a condition of this award is that you not accept additional part-time employment, unless it has been specifically approved by your Research Advisor and the Graduate School.

Usual Schedule

Students will be supported by the Graduate Faculty of their language section and by the Department and Chair in their application for the Dissertation Fellowship from the Graduate School after they have successfully completed their doctoral exams and if they have written and had approved by the three members of their dissertation committee one well-researched and developed (not provisional) chapter of the dissertation prior to the March 1 deadline for application.

Students who complete their doctoral exams in spring of their fourth year (if they have done the M.A. here) or of their third year (if they were admitted with M.A. to the doctoral program) will have the following summer and fall to write more than one acceptable chapter, and should be able to complete these requirements prior to the March 1 deadline during their fifth (or fourth) year. They will be supported by the Department unconditionally in their application to the Dean.

Alternate Schedule

Students who complete their doctoral exams in fall of their fifth year (or fourth, if they entered with M.A.), because they are doing an additional degree certificate in Women's Studies or another area, because they entered the graduate program at mid-year, or because they postponed or redid their exams, will probably not have time to write and have approved a chapter of their dissertations in the three months intervening between their exams and the Dissertation Fellowship application deadline of March 1.

Students in this situation will need to write and have approved by the three members of their dissertation committee a ten-page prospectus plus bibliography, indicating what they plan to do in their dissertation. Students of this group who do so will be provisionally supported by the Department on their Dissertation Fellowship application of March 1, and will need to complete and have accepted one chapter by August of the next summer, in order to be eligible to receive the fellowship.

Certificate students, such as those in Women's Studies, receive an added semester of TA support and therefore receive the fellowship for the calendar year beginning in January, rather than starting in September for the academic year. Students admitted at midyear will, similarly, receive the fellowship according to the calendar year.

Others who retake or delay their Ph.D. exams until November will, however, not receive an additional semester of TA funding, and will receive the fellowship for the academic year beginning in late August only if they successfully complete an accepted first chapter on time. Please note: For the financial paper work to be processed by the mid August deadline in the case of these students, their chapter will need to be accepted by August 10. Students are strongly advised to have a chapter draft prepared for their committee members by May 1, to allow time for revisions or expansions that may be deemed necessary by the committee for an acceptable chapter.

Departmental expectations of students during their year of Dissertation Fellowship.

In order to encourage students to pace their work appropriately during the Dissertation Fellowship year, the faculty of Romance Languages and Literatures will require, as of the 2000-2001 academic year, that recipients of the fellowship have completed and accepted a full second chapter by November 1 of the first semester (or by March 1, if they receive the fellowship through the calendar year), in order to qualify for the continuation of the fellowship during the second semester (drafts are not acceptable.) The Graduate School will be notified by the Department of a student's eligibility for continued funding based on the student's progress (i.e. two accepted chapters) in the dissertation; funding will NOT automatically continue into the second semester.

This policy is intended to assure that students will in fact finish their degrees while still under funding, and enter the job market in a competitive position for tenure-track job openings. It also seeks to protect the department's ability to obtain dissertation fellowships for future students, since those who receive the fellowship and do not finish their degree raise questions in the Dean's mind as to the efficacy of this extra year of funding in enabling doctoral candidates to graduate.

Students are thus strongly advised to adhere to the following writing schedule during the dissertation fellowship year:

First semester of fellowship:

• Second chapter drafted, given to committee, and revised by Nov. 1 (or March 1) of the first semester of funding.
• Third chapter in draft by end of first semester of fellowship funding.

Second semester of fellowship:

• Third chapter revised one month later.
• Fourth chapter drafted, given to committee by March 1 (or Nov. 1) of the second semester.
• Introduction, revision of fourth chapter, other materials by mid-April (or mid-December).

Defense and Graduation

Students who receive the fellowship for the academic year may plan on either a May or August graduation, depending on when the final copies are available and the Ph.D. orals may be scheduled.

Students who receive the fellowship for the calendar year should plan on a January defense and May graduation; they may need to find other employment for the spring, since students are not assured graduate funding beyond the dissertation fellowship.