So you want to apply for a PhD fellowship?
So you want to apply for a PhD fellowship?
Arjun Raj, with much input from Mira Krendel and Dave Bridges
Links
Nice website maintained by Penn:
https://www.med.upenn.edu/bgs/predoctoral-fellowships.html
List of Penn training grants:
https://www.med.upenn.edu/training-grants-fellowships/pdf.pdf
What is a PhD fellowship?
A PhD in the sciences is typically a paid position: as a PhD student, you typically don’t pay tuition, but rather receive a stipend from the university for living expenses. Which leaves the question of where the funds for these things come from ;). There are any number of sources, which can include training grants and mentor grants… and individual fellowships. These fellowships will cover some to all of the stipend and tuition expenses associated with your graduate education, with the remainder covered by other sources. Fellowships also sometimes come with various programmatic training opportunities, such as fellow meetings and conferences, and often provide some modest funds for travel and computers/supplies. A couple important points:
These funds are NOT intended to pay for the costs of the actual research project, which are typically going to be considerably more than what the fellowship provides for expenses and supplies. Those costs are typically borne by the mentor, and you should make sure your project is in scope.
Why get a PhD fellowship?
PhD fellowships are good to get! :) First off, obviously, they provide funds. Sometimes that can afford some feeling of flexibility to the trainee. These funds can also free up funding in the mentor’s lab to support the research. They are also valuable for career purposes, because getting one can be a signifier of a scientist’s ability to write grants and get them funded.
How to get a PhD fellowship?
The first step is to decide what you want to apply for and when. There are a large number of these fellowships available, and it is worth looking through lists (1) to see which ones you want to apply for. Each will have different requirements and may be judged on different criteria. Don’t overlook the ones with specific eligibility criteria. These can often be somewhat less competitive due to those restrictions. Another key thing is to decide when to apply. For some, they go more on track record, and so you don’t have to have a very coherent plan from your new lab to apply. Others (NIH especially) do expect a well formulated research strategy that often favors students who have a bit more preliminary data. All that said, DO NOT talk yourself out of applying (“I don’t have enough data/I’m not good enough/etc.”). The only way to get one is to apply, and to be honest, the review process is far more random than you might expect, so just go for it.
Once you have a target application and deadline, then you have to actually prepare your application. Be sure to leave yourself enough time to assemble a compelling application. Most people tend to focus on the research strategy part of the application, and that is for sure important, but equally important is a number of other documents (training plan, mentoring plan, so forth) that you will need to also assemble for your application. Some of these are pretty boilerplate (facilities and equipment for NIH grants, etc.), and some are specific but have to hit on some key points. We are assembling examples of all these documents to help model your proposal on. Furthermore, you will typically need to get letters of reference, and you’ll need to leave your letter writers enough time to write a good letter (more on letters later). Total time required is probably on the order of 2-3 months, of which some subfraction will be active time. Also keep in mind that you typically need to interface with the grants administrators at your university, and they may have internal deadlines that are well ahead of the actual deadline.
Of course, all that aside, the research strategy is certainly the most critical single document that you will upload. There are several documents out there on how to approach writing these. We will be continually assembling these documents here.
Keep in mind that there are several successful strategies for writing a good research proposal, and there are no hard and fast rules. Here’s an idea that I roughly follow. First, answer the questions in this doc. Now take an annotated example of a successful fellowship, and put your own answers into that template. Seriously, you can get pretty far with just that.
Another critical component is to get feedback. The first level is self-feedback: take a day off, go through this feedback doc, search and replace these words, go through these annotated examples (1, 2, 3), read some docs on how to improve your writing (1, 2, 3, 4), and come back with a fresh mind. (For what it’s worth, I find the general guides with “principles” to be less effective than concrete tips and annotated examples, at least until you know what you’re doing.) One next step is to solicit help from peers. This level of feedback will help identify issues with clarity, especially. Finally, feedback from faculty, especially your advisor, will be critical, in particular for big picture aspects of the proposal. Please keep in mind that faculty time can be in short supply, hence, we have this checklist of things to go through first—that way, faculty will spend their time providing you the most valuable feedback rather than basic issues regarding clarity and so forth.
Letter writers
Most fellowships require 2-3 (or more) letters of reference (these letters are not to be confused with “letters of support” for NIH grants, which serve a different purpose). Note: NIH grants sometimes have a “Mentor Statement”, which is essentially a letter from your mentor, IN ADDITION to the standard letters. Anyway, one key decision is who to ask for the letter. In general, the more recent and more substantial they are, the better. Here’s my rank ordering of potential letter writers:
PhD advisor (duh)
Very strong undergraduate research experience
Successful research rotation advisor during PhD
Thesis committee chair or member
Class during PhD in which you did very well
Class during undergrad in which you did very well
If you have multiple of 2, then use those before going to 3, and so forth. I think opinions may vary on 2 vs. 3, but people who have reviewed have told me 2 is better than 3. Perhaps include both if possible. Also, as goes without saying, if one of these experiences was not so hot, then keep on going down the list.
Once you know who to ask, then the next step is to write an email asking them for a letter. I typically have people in the lab CC me on the request, but either way I guess. The email should be short and sweet, include the deadline, include an “out” for them, and come with an offer to draft a letter. Like:
Hi Dr. GreatRotation,
Hope all is well. I am writing because I plan to apply for an F31 PhD fellowship, and I was hoping you would consider writing a letter of recommendation for me. I greatly enjoyed my rotation in your lab and learned a lot, and so I thought a letter from you would really help my application.
The letter itself is due on August 22nd, and I can forward the instructions for uploading the letter to you or your assistant. Also, I’d be happy to prepare a bullet-point list of highlights or a draft letter to make things easier.
Thank you so much for considering my request, and of course no problem if you are unable to write a letter for me for any reason.
Thanks,
Pat McStudent
Ping with a reminder in a week if you haven’t heard back, or ask your advisor to ask them.
You may be wondering how in the world to write a letter for yourself. It’s pretty awkward, but your letter writer will really appreciate a well thought out draft (plus, they might get it done sooner, which will ease your mind as the deadline looms). Here’s a guide for how to write a letter for yourself. Aside from direct interactions, your draft letter can highlight publications from any research experience (including undergrad) and relevant coursework, and things like abstracts selected for presentations or specialized training. Alternatively, you can offer to send a bullet-point list of points that the letter writer may want to include, although I would recommend offering both (I personally would rather get a draft letter to work from).
For the mentor/sponsor letter, a couple things that typically need to be in that letter are:
Some description of the training plan and how it is tailored to the applicant.
Some statement saying that the mentor has the funding and other resources to support the proposed work.
What are you judged on?
What you are judged on differs by fellowship. Most of them place a lot of emphasis on the candidate themself, which will largely hinge on the letters, so choose your letter writers wisely. Your academic transcript can also be a factor. The degree to which the research plan factors is highly variable. NIH factors this in pretty heavily, with peer review often centering a lot on those long-winded details. Some have very short research proposals, and I suspect that while it is important that it is exciting, they are judging more on the candidate than the details of the project per se. Also, the training plan can also be subject to a lot of scrutiny; see here for a worked example of what is required. However, this is really just an exercise in ticking boxes: if you are careful to put in the (admittedly extensive) set of things you need into the training plan, you should be okay. Private fellowships sometimes have interviews and so forth, who knows what that’s about so just do your best.
For NSF/NIH fellowships, you will get some feedback, sometimes rather detailed. This feedback can be very valuable, since you can submit revisions for some of these. However, for these ones, you should definitely try and go over your reviews with the program officer. They will have been in the room during the discussion and might be able to relay some information about a criticism that came up that was not fully noted down in the written critique, and may have some suggestions for how to revise. It is tempting to bug them about whether the fellowship will be funded. By all means ask, but you’re probably not going to get much of an answer, although if it’s very unlikely they might tell you that. For most private fellowships, you’ll probably get a generic “We had many outstanding applicants this year and unfortunately were unable to make offers to all of them” or some such thing. Oh well. Just remember that while getting a fellowship is nice, it doesn’t make or break your academic career, and getting a fellowship also has a pretty big random component. What’s far more important and in your control is the science you actually do. So spend as much time as you can on that, and hey, if a fellowship comes through, then great!
Good luck!
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