Funding & Financial Support
Financial Aid & Scholarships
San Diego State University provides its students a variety of financial aid and scholarship options including loans, grants, work study, internal scholarships, and external scholarships. All financial aid and scholarships are managed through the Office of Financial Aid and Scholarships (OFAS). Learn about your financial aid options and get financial aid help by exploring the SDSU Office of Financial Aid website. San Diego State also has over 700 scholarship opportunities to support our students’ educational goals. The application portal, “Aztec Scholarships,” allows students to apply for university scholarships via one application.
Internal Graduate Fellowships and Scholarships
The College of Graduate Studies offers numerous awards for eligible graduate students. Internal awards are typically funded by university sources such as Academic Affairs or Associated Students, or funded by the state through sources like the Chancellor’s Office. Awards are available for both master’s and doctoral students with some requiring the student to directly apply and others require faculty nomination. For a complete list of internal fellowships and scholarships, please visit the Office of Graduate Studies website. Some of the available fellowships are highlighted here:
- Graduate Equity Fellowship
- A fellowship for master’s students that are California residents, have a 3.00 GPA, and demonstrate a financial need.
- Master’s Research Scholarship (Faculty Nomination Only)
- A competitive one-year program awarding excellent master’s students with a $10,000 scholarship.
- Presidential Graduate Research Fellowship (Faculty Nomination Only)
- A competitive program providing a nonresident tuition waiver for out-of-state and international students. It waives the $420 per unit fee for nonresident students for the 2024-2025 academic year.
- University Graduate Fellowship (Faculty Nomination Only)
- A competitive two-year fellowship with a minimum annual stipend of $30,000. In one year, the student is funded by the College of Graduate Studies; in the other year, the student is funded by a matching commitment made by the faculty mentor.
Student Travel Funds
Students are encouraged to present their research at conferences and meetings to engage in the research community and contribute to their professional development. Travel funds are often offered by the conferences and we encourage students to seek out such awards. Other options for student travel funds offered by SDSU include:
- SDSU Graduate Student Travel Fund
-
- Approximately $30,000 is available annually to support graduate student travel during three cycles, fall (September 1 – December 31), spring (January 1 – June 30), and summer (July 1 – August 31).
- SDSU Institutionally Related Funds
-
Provided by the College of Sciences, the IRA funding supports student travel to professional meetings to present the results of their research. Applications are considered two times during the academic year, with deadlines on November 1 (for travel July 1 – December 31), and April 1 (for travel January 1 – June 30). The amount of the awards will vary depending on how many students apply and how much funding is available during the period in which the student applies. In the past the awards have ranged from $50-$150 for in-state travel, $200-$350 for out-of-state travel and $400-500 for international travel. For information about how to apply, please reach out to the College of Sciences.
-
Teaching Assistantships
The Computational Science Research Center offers various teaching assistant positions to Doctoral Program students. Please indicate on the JDP application form if you are interested in being considered for a teaching assistantship position.
For more information about TA/GA/ISA hiring, please visit the Graduate Student Employment page.
Additional Funding Resources
There are a variety of external fellowships that master’s and doctoral students in the computational science program may be eligible for. For many of these fellowships, the SDSU Office of Research & Innovation provides workshops to assist students in developing their applications.
- Fulbright Graduate Fellowship
- National Defense Science and Engineering Graduate Fellowship
- DOE Computational Science Graduate Fellowship
- NSF Graduate Research Fellowships (GRFP)
- NIH Predoctoral Fellowship (F31)
- Argonne National Laboratory-Graduate Research Fellowships
- Microsoft Ada Lovelace Fellowships
- Science, Mathematics and Research for Transformation (SMART) Scholarships for Service
- Google CAHSI Dissertation Award
Many CSRC students take advantage of internships during their summer months. Often times, such internships provide ample financial support during the internship time. Students are encouraged to seek out internship opportunities and discuss such opportunities with their faculty advisors.
- Sandia Laboratory in Albuquerque, New Mexico
- Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in Berkeley, California
- Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, California
- Argonne National Laboratory in Chicago, Illinois
- Networking Research Internships CAIDA Affiliates
- Los Alamos National Laboratory in Santa Fe, New Mexico
- Data Science Summer Institute Program at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, California
- NSF Fellowships for Transformative Computational Science using CyberInfrastructure
- Argonne National Laboratory Postdoctoral Program
- NIH Postdoctoral Training Programs
- DOE John Von Neumann Postdoctoral Research Fellowships in Computational Science
- Army Research Laboratory Postdoctorate Fellowship Program through Oak Ridge Associated Universities
- NRC-NRL (Naval Research Laboratory) Cooperative Research Associateship Program
- ASEE-NRL (Naval Research Laboratory) Postdoctoral Fellowship Program
- Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) Postdoctoral Fellowships
- Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy Science and Technology Policy Fellowships
- National Center For Computational Toxicology (NCCT) Post-Doctoral Research Program
- Sandia National Laboratories Truman Fellowships