The department has several sources of funding for graduate students. Students may be funded by
Assistantships are awarded on a merit basis. There is no separate application for financial support. Each applicant is considered for support while being considered for admission. As a general rule, master's students are supported for four semesters while Ph.D. students who already hold a master's degree are supported for six semesters. Students who receive financial aid are expected to carry a full academic load and maintain a GPA of 3.0. Normally, financial aid commitments are made for no more than one year at a time. A half-time assistantship calls for a service obligation of 20 hours per week. Those students receiving assistantships or fellowships receive health insurance coverage and certain amounts of in-state and out-of-state tuition. They are responsible to pay their own fees.
In 2004, the Statistics department at NCSU received a $1.59 million dollar NSF-VIGRE grant. VIGRE stands for “Vertical InteGration of Research and Education.” This was the second time the department was awarded a VIGRE grant. The department was only one of three selected nationwide to receive this grant for a second time and was the only pure statistics department to do so. The VIGRE grant provides traineeships for several graduate students each year. VIGRE trainees must be US Citizens or US Permanent Residents. The main goals of this program are: provide a wide variety of experiences (research, teaching, industrial experience, etc.); generate an excitement for research early in their career; work in one of the four major areas of research – biomedical statistics, environmental statistics, industrial statistics and statistical genetics; and reduce the time to graduation. It is hoped that the trainees will work in vertically integrated teams and participate actively in VIGRE content and skills workshops.
Fellowships are provided through the department’s Gertrude M. Cox Fellowship Fund and are
awarded on the basis of academic excellence to either incoming or continuing
students in statistics. The Cox
Fellowship Fund was established to honor Miss Gertrude Mary Cox, the “first
lady of the world of statistics.” Dr.
Cox, a nationally recognized educator, organized the first Department of Statistics
in the nation at NCSU where she was instrumental in developing the
internationally renowned
The main function of the teaching assistant is to help the faculty with the service teaching program. Half-time teaching assistant appointments carry responsibilities that require about 20 hours per week and run up to nine months, from mid-August through mid-May. In a given semester, those teaching assistants with a sufficient background who are fluent in English may be asked to serve as instructors for a section of an undergraduate course. Other teaching assistants will be assigned to grade papers and provide tutorial assistance to students for one or more courses. Several faculty members appoint students to research assistantships, normally in the second or later years of study. The function of the research assistant is to assist designated faculty members with their research or consulting programs. In each case, the specific duties and responsibilities of the research assistant will be determined by the supervisor. Research assistant appointments normally carry a 20-hour per week obligation and run for twelve months.
The function of the industrial trainee is to assist
designated industry researchers with their research, consulting and training
programs. Industrial trainee
appointments may require students to spend up to 20 hours per week at the
sponsoring industry. Traineeships
normally run for twelve months. Because of the department’s proximity to
Students may be funded through other sources including national fellowships, NCSU Diversity Fellowships or other fellowships that the department sponsors.