Semester-long dissertation completion fellowships will be available in 2026-2027 for PhD students who are making good progress toward the degree and who can provide a compelling statement about their research completion timeline. Preference will be given to students in the later stages of their careers, and funds will only be available to students with no remaining fellowship support. Students who receive a Dean's Dissertation Completion Fellowship will be expected to defend their dissertation within a year of receiving the fellowship.
The stipend of $21,218 for the Dean's Dissertation Completion Fellowship will be distributed from August-December for fall 2026 or January-May for spring 2027.
There will be two calls for the Graduate School Dean's Dissertation Completion Fellowship: one in spring 2026 for the fall 2026 semester and a second call in fall 2026 for the spring 2027 semester. Programs may nominate two candidates for each of these deadlines, for a total of four candidates. Alternatively, the same student may be nominated in both the spring 2026 and fall 2026 semesters. If you submit more than one candidate, you will be asked to rank them in the nomination form.
Programs will submit the information below to the Graduate School for their candidates. For a copy of the signature page template, please click here. Please note that students will not apply to the Graduate School directly, but rather to their program who will then nominate them via this application site.
- A description of the student’s dissertation, which should demonstrate the project’s contribution to the field and its grounding in relevant scholarship and methodology. The proposal should make a compelling statement about the planned work and be accessible to scholars in a broad range of fields. The research area/dissertation description submitted by the candidate to the PhD program should be in 12-point Times New Roman, single-spaced with 1” margins, numbered pages, and a header on every page that includes the student’s name and title of the dissertation (approximately 500-1,000 words).
- A curriculum vitae
- Summary of progress and plans for degree completion, including dates of screening, qualifying exams and anticipated dissertation defense, listed in a table format
- Brief summary of funding to date. For example, dates of internal and external fellowships, RA and/or TA appointments, listed in a table format
- USC unofficial transcript or STARs report (scanned documents are acceptable).
- Signature page signed by the student’s dissertation advisor, department chair, and Dean or Dean’s proxy affirming that the student is making satisfactory progress to the degree.
- One letter of recommendation provided by a faculty member in the student’s home program and uploaded as a PDF document by the program’s designated nominator.
USC Graduate School Dean's Dissertation Completion Fellowship
Semester-long dissertation completion fellowships will be available in 2026-2027 for PhD students who are making good progress toward the degree and who can provide a compelling statement about their research completion timeline. Preference will be given to students in the later stages of their careers, and funds will only be available to students with no remaining fellowship support. Students who receive a Dean's Dissertation Completion Fellowship will be expected to defend their dissertation within a year of receiving the fellowship.
The stipend of $21,218 for the Dean's Dissertation Completion Fellowship will be distributed from August-December for fall 2026 or January-May for spring 2027.
There will be two calls for the Graduate School Dean's Dissertation Completion Fellowship: one in spring 2026 for the fall 2026 semester and a second call in fall 2026 for the spring 2027 semester. Programs may nominate two candidates for each of these deadlines, for a total of four candidates. Alternatively, the same student may be nominated in both the spring 2026 and fall 2026 semesters. If you submit more than one candidate, you will be asked to rank them in the nomination form.
Programs will submit the information below to the Graduate School for their candidates. For a copy of the signature page template, please click here. Please note that students will not apply to the Graduate School directly, but rather to their program who will then nominate them via this application site.
- A description of the student’s dissertation, which should demonstrate the project’s contribution to the field and its grounding in relevant scholarship and methodology. The proposal should make a compelling statement about the planned work and be accessible to scholars in a broad range of fields. The research area/dissertation description submitted by the candidate to the PhD program should be in 12-point Times New Roman, single-spaced with 1” margins, numbered pages, and a header on every page that includes the student’s name and title of the dissertation (approximately 500-1,000 words).
- A curriculum vitae
- Summary of progress and plans for degree completion, including dates of screening, qualifying exams and anticipated dissertation defense, listed in a table format
- Brief summary of funding to date. For example, dates of internal and external fellowships, RA and/or TA appointments, listed in a table format
- USC unofficial transcript or STARs report (scanned documents are acceptable).
- Signature page signed by the student’s dissertation advisor, department chair, and Dean or Dean’s proxy affirming that the student is making satisfactory progress to the degree.
- One letter of recommendation provided by a faculty member in the student’s home program and uploaded as a PDF document by the program’s designated nominator.