<p>Mini wrote: I explained it to my d. as the equivalent of applying for a 5-year/$300,000 job (tuition plus fellowship funding plus extras), and the chance to move up in one’s career.</p>
<p>That is an interesting way to look at it, though I don’t think you want the person feeling they are locked into the position (no doubt the university would like the person to feel that way, but I don’t think it’s a good thing for anyone to ever feel <em>locked</em> into a position unless they truly are, like when one signs up for military service), and naturally, no graduate student signs anything (far as I know) promising to stay on for X years, nor does the graduate program promise funding for more than one year at a time (it’s always contingent upon progressing toward the degree up to the university’s standards, far as I have heard). The price also obviously varies (for our son, the package is over $80K/year and that doesn’t even included things like their ordering things like laptops, desktop monitors, special keyboards, and lots of other equipment at his request; his program is also for 6 years with many taking more than six years and still being fully funded despite the extra years over that the program expects in writing). And the price will go up every year as the stipend goes up every year (or has so far) as does the tuition credit and health insurance cost the university pays. Plus, as a student progresses in research and publications, I am guessing the university sends the student on more trips to present papers, do research, whatever and that is yet more money that goes up as the years go by. The only things I am somewhat surprised the universities don’t give the students is some kind of retirement program (not even to contribute to it so much as to have one in place for students to contribute to in addition to the Roth IRA, as the stipend is large enough to allow for that kind of saving and the sooner you start saving for retirement, the better) and dental care (some do, mind you, but our son’s doesn’t, and he is going to need his wisdom teeth removed next year, so is lucky to still be under 18 and covered by his father’s company’s dental insurance and will just have to come back to our state next summer to have it done; I’m not sure if my husband’s insurance will cover our son once he turns 18, but maybe they will if he is still a full-time student, though being that he hasn’t been a dependent of ours since he was 14, I sort of doubt it). But overall, I am impressed with how generous many Ph.D. programs are with their financing. I only wish top law schools and MBA programs were the same.</p>