There is no distinction made between National Institutes of Health (NIH)
supported Fellows and those funded by other mechanisms. All students
admitted to the Stony Brook University MSTP are considered MSTP Fellows.
MSTP Fellows receive a full tuition scholarship and health
insurance during their entire stay at Stony
Brook University. Fellows also receive a stipend designed to be competitive
nationally and adjusted for the cost of living on Long Island. The stipend
for year (2009-2010 is $26,500. During the graduate phase of the MSTP,
students can optionally apply for external fellowships (e.g. from NIH,
U.S. Army Breast Cancer, American Heart Association, Merck Pharmaceuticals).
If successful, these fellowships will increase their stipend amount
by 10% (e.g. to $29,150 this year). MSTP also supports costs of traveling
to scientific and career development meetings and a variety of enrichment
opportunities.
In addition to the standard MSTP support, there are also local support
to qualified underrepresented candidates. Please see the below links.
The board
of trustees of the State University of New York system has voted to
open up to low-income whites two scholarship programs that had been
reserved for minority students. This past year the $6.2 million Graduate
Fellowship program provided financial aid to about 500 minority students
at 24 SUNY campuses. The Empire State Minority Honors Scholarships benefited
898 students. Since 1987 the two scholarship programs have been exclusively
for black, Hispanic, and American Indian students.
The
action by the SUNY trustees came after the university, along with 200
other institutions of higher education, received a letter from the right-wing
Center for Equal Opportunity. The letter strongly hinted that legal
action or the filing of a complaint with the Department of Education's
Office for Civil Rights would be made if the programs remained exclusively
for minority students.
