Funding
Students admitted to the Ph.D. program are provided with 5 years of funding (pending satisfactory progress in the program). The standard funding package is a Teaching Assistant (TA) position, where a TA manages recitation sections and grading for a large lecture course led by a professor in the department. Other forms of TA work are sometimes available, as well as various Research Assistant (RA) positions working for the department or specific faculty. Decisions about TA/RA positions are made on the basis of departmental need, student preference, and student performance/progress in the program.
During the 5 years spent as a TA/RA, students are provided with a stipend covering the 9 months of the academic year. Stipend amounts are highly competitive in comparison to those at other Philosophy Ph.D. programs, especially once the cost of living for Central Indiana is taken into account. In addition, the department has an established practice of providing summer funding and support for conference travel.
Fellowships
Purdue offers a number of competitive fellowships for graduate students, aimed at recruiting applicants and rewarding performance amongst current students. The current list of such fellowships is available here. The department routinely nominates qualified applicants and students for all such available fellowships.
Philosophy Department Grants
The department has two grants dedicated to provide further assistance to graduate students.
The William L. McBride Graduate Student International Travel Grant
The McBride Family created this fund in 2005. Angela McBride is Distinguished Professor Emerita of the School of Nursing, Indiana University. Bill McBride is the Arthur G. Hansen Distinguished Professor in the Department of Philosophy at Purdue University.
The fund’s purpose is to support one or two Philosophy graduate students each year with a stipend for international travel to conferences or study abroad programs. Students in the Department of Philosophy’s graduate program, including graduate students in interdisciplinary programs with their home department in Philosophy, are eligible to apply.
Applications should be submitted to the Department Head, Christopher Yeomans. The maximum award is $1200 which can be used to cover airfare, hotel expenses, and conference fees. Students may apply to receive support for international travel, except to Canada and Mexico, completed between September 1 of the current year and September 1 of the following year. The Department’s Grants and Awards Committee Applications will review the applications and select recipients on the basis of merit.
Graduate School Summer Research Grants
Each year, Purdue's Graduate School offers a small number of summer research grants to graduate students in Philosophy. The number of these grants varies from year to year.
All graduate students are automatically considered, but priority is normally given to students who have begun working on their dissertations and are in their 3rd, 4th, or 5th year of study. Selection criteria include (i) merit and (ii) departmental teaching needs in the summer. The recipients are selected by the Department Head, acting upon the advice of the Graduate Committee and the Director of Graduate Recruitment, Admission and Funding.