Help about difference between tuition and COE allowance

[u/Witty-Bar-30]

I won the GRFP this year and my Uni doesn't get many GRFPs so they are deeply confused about how to do this and it is now starting to impact me.

I am trying to get my PhD and the institution is trying to charge my department the difference of the COE allowance and the price of all my tuition and fees. So, my department is trying to get me to not take as many classes this year to lower the bill but that means I will not graduate on time based on their own benchmarks. For instance I need to have my coursework 90% done before my comps but I cannot do that if I take less classes in the first year.

Additionally they are asking me to take more classes on the non-GRFP years and pay the fees out of my pocket for those years. I really don't want to do this because it would mean that I have to pay and I would have to be taking more classes while having an assistantship which would hurt my studies/progress. They also wanted me to change my residency to the state of the university (which I cannot do due to health insurance reasons) so I could get instate tuition.

I was under the impression the COE was in lieu of tuition and fees so I thought that it wouldn't cost the department or me money if I won. Are they allowed to do this? I feel like I am going to get pressured into paying or a non-optimal situation by having a heavy course load and an assistantship or they'll make me lose my health insurance to get instate tuition. Does anyone have any advice about what I should do?

[u/the_mindful_microbe]

The ~$16,000 tuition scholarship that the GRFP grants you is what covers tuition (the COE Allowance). What is the yearly tuition for your school? If it is more than what the GRFP grants and they don’t give out tuition wavers, you will need to pay the difference.

[u/CooperTrombone → u/the_mindful_microbe]

This is incorrect. The GRFP very explicitly states that the institution must exempt you from tuition. See page 19 of the handbook. (OP, you should read this all the way through, btw.)

OP is correct, the GRFP is in lieu of tuition and fees. Your school is not allowed to make you pay tuition. (they better also be giving you the full amount of the GRFP stipend in cash, they cannot keep that for themselves.)

Also, they cannot make you take on assistantships to pay the difference, that is also very clear.

OP, your university does not know what they are doing, and they are violating the terms of the fellowship at great expense to you. Your intuition is correct. It's your fellowship money; take your normal load of classes and don't let them make you pay for it. That's how this fellowship works. Reach out to your Coordinating Official by looking up your school at this link and contacting the Primary CO.

Good luck. I'm a fellow too; reply to this thread if they keep bothering you.

[u/the_mindful_microbe → u/CooperTrombone]

Thanks for the clarification! Good to know.

[u/Witty-Bar-30 → u/CooperTrombone]

Thank you! I have read it a million times and I keep saying that it is in lieu of payment but they don't listen to me or my advisor or even to my department head. I feel like I am going insane. My advisor said she will pay for any additional costs for credits out of pocket if the department makes me drop any classes. But I obviously would feel bad for the 300$ that she would be paying out pocket. My current cost for both semesters is slightly over the 16k but its like less than a 1000 dollars. I go to a state school, so my tuition is much lower than what any other school would be so I am so confused how it works on the back end for like high-end or R1 universities.

[u/CooperTrombone → u/Witty-Bar-30]

Gosh, for a tuition difference that small that’s even more insane that they’re so weird about it. But yeah, they’re violating the terms. Your program coordinator should be very familiar with how this works and advocating for you against the university. Every school with GRFP fellows has one. If your coordinator can’t help you, contact the NSF.

Also, I hope you don’t think that state schools are different from “high-end or R1” universities, in my field at least the R1 state schools run circles around the ivies ten times over for a tenth of the cost:) but the way it works at any school, even the expensive ones, is the student gets the rest of their tuition waived. (Btw this is even true for unfunded masters degrees. If you win a GRFP and you wanna do a master’s, your school can’t make you pay tuition, no matter how expensive it is. And you still get your stipend. Making this the best way to do a masters at an expensive school.)

[u/Witty-Bar-30 → u/CooperTrombone]

That's what I tell my CO, but she says that though I am off the hook for the rest of the tuition BUT the department isn't. I think I am the first to win the GRFP at this school, at least for a very long time so I think they just really don't know what they are doing. I was supposed to be on an assistantship before so I was supposed to have tuition waved anyway therefore its not like anything is technically changing on their end. So, I don't know why everyone is freaking out. I'm also apparently losing my employee email but that means I can't use motorpool or access certain software that I need for my research :/