Fellowship Stipend Support and the Supply of Science and Engineering Students: NSF Graduate Research Fellowships

摘要

Fellowship and traineeship awards that pay students for their studies provide income to many graduate students in science and engineering (S&E) and potentially affect decisions to pursue graduate training. Fellowships and other stipends influence student choice of graduate education by raising graduate student incomes relative to alternatives, signaling students about their likely success in graduate study, and increasing the time students have to study as opposed to work. In 2001, 13 percent of full-time graduate students reported that their primary source of graduate support was either a fellowship or traineeship, with one-third obtaining their awards from federal government agencies (National Science Foundation, 2001 [tables 39, 40]). Because many government-funded awards, such as National Science Foundation (NSF) fellowships, are limited to citizens or residents, they are a potentially critical policy tool for inducing natives (or other preferred groups) to study S&E and thus to raise their representation in the S&E workforce.