Fellowships and Awards

The Graduate School offers several competitive fellowships that current graduate students and prospective applicants can apply to. Prospective applicants must submit a fellowship application and be accepted into the English program in order to be eligible. The main Graduate School fellowships are: 

  • Advanced Opportunity Program (AOP) Fellowship 
    The Advanced Opportunity Program Fellowship is funded by the State of Wisconsin. AOP Fellowships are designed to assist underrepresented racial/ethnic minority as well as disadvantaged non-minority students in graduate study to enter and complete a graduate degree at UWM. The AOP Fellowship is open to master’s and doctoral students, is renewable, and provides tuition remission, academic-year stipend, travel award, and eligibility for state-sponsored health insurance. 
  • Distinguished Graduate Student Fellowship (DGSF) 
    The DGSF is a one-year non-renewable fellowship that provides tuition remission, academic-year stipend, travel award, and eligibility for state-sponsored health insurance. The award is open to both master’s students and doctoral students who will not achieve dissertator status before the application deadline of the award. These awards are typically granted to students already enrolled after their first year. 
  • Distinguished Dissertation Fellowship (DDF) 
    The DDF is a one-year non-renewable fellowship that provides tuition remission, academic-year stipend, travel award, and eligibility for state-sponsored health insurance. The award is for continuing PhD students who have either achieved dissertator status or will do so by the start of the academic year of the award. 

Chancellor’s Graduate Student Award

The Chancellor’s Graduate Student Award (CGSA) program is designed to give UWM a competitive edge in attracting and retaining high-quality, talented graduate students. There is no application for the award. Each program in English grants these awards to incoming students as part of the admissions process. These are generous one-year non-renewable awards and are typically several thousand dollars. They can be awarded in addition to a Teaching Assistantship. 

Graduate Student Travel Award 

The Graduate School Travel Award offers partial funding to UWM master’s and doctoral students for presenting scholarly and creative works at conferences, performances, or exhibitions. Students must apply for funds before the event, and funding is provided as reimbursement of expenses after the travel has been completed. Doctoral students are allotted a total of $1,000 for travel expenses, and  master’s students are allotted a total of $500 for travel expenses. These funds can be spent on a single trip or can be spread across multiple trips. 

Department of English Awards 

English makes a number of awards to students already enrolled in the program. These include the Tinsley Helton Dissertation Fellowship, the Frederick J. Hoffman Award for Best Graduate Student Essay, awards for teaching excellence, and a number of creative writing awards. See our Scholarships and Awards page for award descriptions and details. For more information about these awards, contact the Director of Graduate Studies in the English Department. 

Other Funding

UWM Land Acknowledgement: We acknowledge in Milwaukee that we are on traditional Potawatomi, Ho-Chunk and Menominee homeland along the southwest shores of Michigami, North America’s largest system of freshwater lakes, where the Milwaukee, Menominee and Kinnickinnic rivers meet and the people of Wisconsin’s sovereign Anishinaabe, Ho-Chunk, Menominee, Oneida and Mohican nations remain present.   |   To learn more, visit the Electa Quinney Institute website.