TTDGRA Program Information for Fall 2023 to Spring 2026 Cycle
The Top Tier Doctoral Graduate Research Assistantship (formerly DGRA) program will support approximately 40 doctoral graduate research assistantships. This competitive program will fund selected proposals for research and creative activity that involve the use of one state funded doctoral research assistant for one academic year, and renewable for up to two additional (3 years of total support: Fall 2023 through Spring 2026). These TTDGRAs will receive the minimum stipend (varies by graduate program) and standard Graduate College GA benefits (tuition, optional health insurance, etc.). Faculty who are awarded TTDGRAs are encouraged to supplement the stipend and/or student tuition/fees with external funds, if available, but this is not required.
TTDGRA proposals should clearly address how the activities will support the 51³Ô¹ÏºÚÁÏ Top Tier effort in some way.
Eligibility
Applicants must be 51³Ô¹ÏºÚÁÏ tenured or tenure-track faculty, with graduate faculty status in the targeted graduate program(s). Collaborative and interdisciplinary proposals are encouraged. If awarded a TTDGRA, faculty may appoint a single doctoral student in good standing for the full 3 years, or give the position to different students in different years of the project. Doctoral students in TTDGRA positions must be enrolled full-time for the duration of the funding, work up to 20 hours per week on research, scholarship, or creative activity related to the TTDGRA proposal, and continue to make satisfactory progress toward degree completion. Faculty TTDGRA awardees who demonstrate annual progress towards project goals will be extended each year, up to the full three years (last eligible semester of funding is spring 2026.)
Submission Guidelines & Information
Please submit the TTDGRA proposal as described in the Request for Proposals. Completed proposals and associated documentation will be submitted to the . The submission deadline is 9 p.m. on August 8th, 2022.
After submission, the proposals will be distributed to the project director’s dean and department chair for review and comment. Next, a select committee of faculty, with representation from each college with graduate programs, will review and rank all of the submitted proposals and make recommendations to the Graduate College. The Graduate College will announce awards in January 2023. For questions about the program, please contact Emily Lin, Associate Dean of the Graduate College.
2023-2026 CYCLE AWARDEES
Congratulations to the 2023-2026 Cycle Awardees
The recipients of our 2023-2026 Top Tier Doctoral Graduate Research Assistant (TTDGRA) grant competition have been selected and notified. You can view the names and project titles of all the TTDGRA recipients (2023-26) in the "Related Links" section. Of the 100 applications, 35 TTDGRAs were funded for the 2023-2026 cycle.
This cycle’s application pool was extremely competitive with many high-quality and notable scholarly projects being considered. We are very appreciative of the TTDGRA Review Committee and the Deans and Department Chairs from the academic units for their valuable feedback and careful consideration of each application. The TTDGRA Review Committee, comprised of representatives from each college/school, made considerable efforts in providing serious, thoughtful review and discussions of the applications. We thank the members of this committee listed below for their dedicated service:
Lee Business School: Greg Moody, Yong Li
College of Education: Chyllis Scott, Heather Dahl-Jacinto
College of Engineering: Jaeyun Moon, Emma Regentova
College of Fine Arts: Anthony Barone, Susanna Newbury
College of Hospitality: Amanda Belarmino, Cass Shum (Co-Chair)
School of Integrated Health Sciences: Jing Nong Liang, Arpita Basu
College of Liberal Arts: Brian Villmoare (Co-Chair), Raquel Casas
School of Nursing: Jennifer Kawi, Lorraine Evangelista
School of Public Health: Tim Bungum, Chris Cochran
College of Sciences: Boo Shan Tseng, Ronald Gary
College of Urban Affairs: Nicholas Barr, Greg Borchard
These results mean that the approximate value of this program is $800,000+ per year for three years, or approximately $2.4+ million dollars. It is also worth noting that the funded proposals are from professors of all ranks (43% Assistants; 37% Associates; 20% Professors) and that 89% are based on collaborative, often multidisciplinary, faculty teams.
Based on our assessment of past TTDGRA recipients and their students, we are confident that the faculty awarded these 35 TTDGRAs will benefit substantially, and that this investment will act as seed funding for increasing their grants and research or scholarly productivity.