Washington, DC, and New York, NY– The Council of Graduate Schools (CGS), the only national association of universities devoted to graduate education and research, and TIAA‐CREF, a leading financial services provider, today rolled out the first phase of a three‐year best practice program designed to improve the financial acumen of graduate and undergraduate students, including debt management skills. Marking the launch of the project announced last fall, CGS released a Request for Proposals (RFP) to all U.S.‐based CGS member institutions.

Through the RFP process, universities and colleges will compete for funding to design financial education programs that prepare students to play an active role in managing their personal finances and make better and more informed decisions about saving, spending, investing and borrowing. Together with CGS and TIAA‐CREF, the selected institutions will develop, assess, promote and share tools and resources for enhancing student financial literacy.

The program will address the diverse needs of students while considering factors such as their socioeconomic backgrounds, fields of study, degree levels and chosen career pathways, each of which has significant financial ramifications. It will also provide students with basic financial education skills to help them plan how to fund their college educations and align students with career paths that could ultimately enable them to repay their college loans. Tools and resources will be made available to all CGS member institutions over the course of the three‐year project, and CGS will publish a best practice guide at the end of the three years.

“Student loan debt is a complex problem, and there are no easy solutions. But we know that increased financial education must be part of the solution,” said Debra W. Stewart, president of CGS. “Today’s students are financially dissimilar to any previous generation. As family income has dropped and public funding for student support has declined, the costs associated with higher education have risen. At both the graduate and undergraduate levels, students carry unprecedented debt burdens. This collaboration among CGS, TIAA‐CREF and universities and colleges aims to confront head on the growing student debt crisis.”

Starting this spring, a selection committee will begin the review process, evaluating proposals based on various criteria, including institutional commitment, the potential of the project to successfully engage students and the quality of the institution’s action plan. All U.S. CGS member institutions are eligible to apply for awards. Priority will be given to proposals from institutions that can provide evidence of the project’s potential to have a direct impact on a significant number of graduate and undergraduate students. Institutions not selected to receive awards will be invited to participate as program affiliates. Affiliate institutions will have access to tools and resources developed by the program and will be invited to share information about their activities.

Applications must be received by CGS no later than May 31, 2013. Awards will be announced by June 30, 2013, for projects that will be implemented in fall 2013 and conclude by June 30, 2015.

More information is available on the CGS website, www.cgsnet.org.

Contacts: Julia Kent, CGS: (202) 223‐3791 / jkent@cgs.nche.edu
John McCool, TIAA‐CREF: (888) 200‐4062 / media@tiaa‐cref.org

Many prospective graduate students are calculating the return on their educational investment and choosing programs designed with internships and work experience in mind.

Students and schools offer advice for pursuing academic goals while supporting a family.

2012 Annual Meeting Program
Selected PowerPoint presentations from the 2012 CGS 52nd Annual Meeting are below. Presentations are in chronological order by each category. Presentations are offered as Adobe Acrobat PDF files. The file size is indicated after the name of each presenter.

Pre-Meeting Workshop Presentations

Fundraising as a Critical Instrument for Improving Graduate Education
Steven Matson (1 MB)
Lisa Tedesco (733 KB)

Assessment and Review of Graduate Programs - Doctoral
Henning Schroeder (598 KB)

Assessment and Review of Graduate Programs - Master's
Robert Augustine (1.97 MB)
Robert Roer (398 KB)

Technology Solutions for Tracking Student Progress
George Justice (1.09 MB)
Nancy Marcus (1.22 MB)

How to Be an Effective Consultant in Graduate Education
Diana Carlin, Deirdre Mageean, and William Wiener (164 KB)

Graduate Schools' Role in Financial Aid
Charles Caramello (1.55 MB)
Paul Gemperline (164 KB)
Brian Lee Sang (1.55 MB)

Legal Issues
Anne Bowden (196 KB)
Ada Meloy (188 KB)

Mentoring through the Back Door: Creating Campus Buy-In for Graduate Student Career and Professional Development by Offering Diverse Opportunities
Henry Campa and Judith Stoddart (1.73 MB)

Promising Strategies and Techniques for Broadening Participation in Graduate Education
David A. Francko (530 KB)
Karen Jackson-Weaver (76 KB)
Dwight McBride (459 KB)

Professional Science Master's (PSM) Affiliation
David King (1.53 MB)

Assessing Learning Outcomes in Online Graduate Education
Michael Barr and Charles McClintock (1.52 MB)

Plenary Sessions Presentations

Creativity on the Benchtop: What Can We Learn from Student Researchers on the Frontiers of Science?
Nancy Nersessian (1.25 MB)

Advancing U.S. Competitiveness in Scientific Research and Education: Innovations at NSF
Subra Suresh (1.63 MB)

Career Outcomes for Graduate Degree Holders: How Do We Track?
Iain Cameron (1.41 MB)
Karen Klomparens (81 KB)
William Russel (772 KB)
Andrew Szeri (562 KB)

Concurrent Sessions Presentations

Advances in Models Supporting Graduate Students and Excellence in Graduate Education
Karen Butler-Purry (1.07 MB)
Joan Ferrini-Mundy (842 KB)

Initial Impacts of CGS's Project on Completion and Attrition in STEM Master's Programs
Samuel Attoh (355 KB)
Andrew Hsu (1.50 MB)
M.J.T. Smith (680 KB)

Dynamic Graduate School Leadership
Robert Augustine (1.87 MB)
Zlatko Skrbis (188 KB)

DIMAC: Promising Practices to Promote Success of Underrepresented Minorities in STEM PhD Programs
Kim E. Barrett (562 KB)
John C. Keller (128 KB)
Karen Liller (562 KB)
Janet Rutledge (128 KB)

Recent Research on the Biomedical Workforce: Implications for Designing Graduate Programs
H. Dele Davies (680 KB)
Allen Rawitch (631 KB)

Financial Support for Master's Students
George Newkome (478 KB)
Mary Osirim (141 KB)

Perceptions of Deans and Students about Graduate Education and Career Opportunities: A Further Analysis of Pathways Through Graduate School and Into Careers
Deirdre Mageean and Cathy Wendler (1.81 MB)

Innovations in Master's Education
Edelma Huntley, Kathleen Long, and Gerald Pogatshnik (99 KB)
Edelma Huntley (108 KB)
Kathleen Long (70 KB)
Case Study (45 KB)

Graduate Student Debt: Issues and Implications
Ramona Mellott (257 KB)

Professional Development Programs
Sinaia Nathanson, Lynne Pepall, and John Stevenson (714 KB)

Preparing Graduate Students for a Global Workforce
Graham Carr (974 KB)
John Wood (1.88 MB)

New Frontiers in Interdisciplinary Education
Maria Allison (636 KB)
Anselm Fremmer (278 KB)

Building Community at Master's Focused Institutions
Jennifer Keane-Dawes (537 KB)
Margaret McManus (1.5 MB)

Creative Solutions to Budgetary Challenges
Introduction (257 KB)
Philip Cohen (207 KB)
Maureen Grasso (286 KB)
Pamela Stacks (167 KB)

Joint and Dual Degree Programs: Planning for Success
Arnaud Chevallier (605 KB)
Dick Strugnell (278 KB)

Sponsored Breakfast Presentations

Presentation from Educational Testing Service Breakfast
David Payne and Eileen Tyson (1.17 MB)

Presentation from ProQuest UMI Breakfast
John Roberts (1.67 MB)

Educators at Duke University and other institutions are looking for ways to help graduate students communicate the value of their highly specialized research to external audiences.

Deadline:  March 1, 2013

Eligibility: Eligible candidates will need to have received the doctoral degree by June 1, 2013.

Duration: 12-18 months

The Council of Graduate Schools (CGS) invites applications from social sciences and humanities scholars who have been awarded the PhD in the past two to three years. The fellowship is designed to provide a highly accomplished early career professional with research and communications experience in the area of graduate education. Specific responsibilities and opportunities will be tailored to the field expertise and the career ambitions of the successful candidate, but will be divided across at least two of the following CGS activities:

• Advancement/Development
• Global Engagement
• CGS Best Practice Research

The postdoc will have opportunities to attend meetings and conferences relevant to his or her work at CGS. Salary will be competitive for the Washington, DC area.

The Council of Graduate Schools, the national voice for the graduate dean community, is the only organization in the United States that is dedicated solely to the advancement of graduate education and research. CGS accomplishes its mission through advocacy in the policy arena, innovative research, and the development and dissemination of best practices. CGS also acts as a convening authority, organizing major events that bring together graduate deans and other stakeholders to discuss and take action on a broad range of issues affecting graduate education today. CGS membership includes over 500 universities in the United States and Canada, and 25 universities outside the U.S. and Canada. Collectively, CGS institutions annually award more than 92 percent of all U.S. doctorates and over 81 percent of all U.S. master's degrees.

Application and Nomination Process

Applications must be e-mailed to Keith Peregonov at kperegonov@cgs.nche.edu or submitted through the CGS Career Portal. Please include a letter of interest, a resume or c.v., and three references with an e-mail address and telephone numbers. Electronic submissions (MS Word or Adobe PDF) are strongly preferred. For full consideration, please ensure that your application is received by March 1, 2013. To learn more about CGS, please visit www.cgsnet.org. 

Deadline:  March 1, 2013

Eligibility: Eligible candidates will need to have received the doctoral degree by June 1, 2013.

Duration: 12-18 months

The Council of Graduate Schools (CGS) invites applications from social sciences and educational research scholars who have been awarded the PhD or equivalent in the past two to three years. The fellowship is designed to provide a highly accomplished early career professional with research and communications experience in the area of graduate education. Specific responsibilities and opportunities will be tailored to the field expertise and the career ambitions of the successful candidate, but will be divided across existing CGS research projects, such as those concerning attrition and completion, financial education, enrollment and degrees, and research ethics, among others.

The postdoc will have opportunities to attend meetings and conferences relevant to his or her work at CGS. Salary will be competitive for the Washington, DC area.

The Council of Graduate Schools, the national voice for the graduate dean community, is the only organization in the United States that is dedicated solely to the advancement of graduate education and research. CGS accomplishes its mission through advocacy in the policy arena, innovative research, and the development and dissemination of best practices. CGS also acts as a convening authority, organizing major events that bring together graduate deans and other stakeholders to discuss and take action on a broad range of issues affecting graduate education today. CGS membership includes over 500 universities in the United States and Canada, and 25 universities outside the U.S. and Canada. Collectively, CGS institutions annually award more than 92 percent of all U.S. doctorates and over 81 percent of all U.S. master's degrees.

Application and Nomination Process

Applications must be emailed to Keith Peregonov at kperegonov@cgs.nche.edu or submitted through the CGS Career Portal. Please include a letter of interest, a resume or c.v., and three references with an email address and telephone numbers. Electronic submissions (MS Word or Adobe PDF) are strongly preferred. For full consideration, please ensure that your application is received by March 1, 2013. To learn more about CGS, please visit www.cgsnet.org.

Contact:
Julia Kent
jkent@cgs.nche.edu
(202) 223-3791

Washington, D.C. (February 7, 2013) – The Council of Graduate Schools (CGS) today released the results of its third annual Professional Science Master’s Enrollment and Degrees Survey documenting applications, enrollments, and degrees awarded in Professional Science Master’s (PSM) programs. The PSM is an innovative graduate degree designed to allow students to pursue advanced training in science or mathematics, while simultaneously developing workplace skills highly valued by employers.

Total Enrollment:

• Total enrollment in PSM programs topped 5,800 students in 2012.
• Total enrollment increased by 22% overall between 2010 and 2012 and by 10% at the PSM programs that responded to the 2010, 2011, and the 2012 surveys.
• Men comprised 55% of all PSM students and women made up 45%.
• 15% of total PSM students enrolled in U.S.-based institutions were temporary residents.
• Among U.S. citizens and permanent residents, 25% of enrollees in the fall of 2012 were underrepresented minorities.
• Total PSM enrollment in fall 2012 was dominated by four fields of study: computer/information sciences (21%), biotechnology (16%), environmental sciences and natural resources (14%), or mathematics and statistics (14%).

• Just over 1,750 PSM degrees were awarded in academic year 2011/12.
• 52% of PSM degrees awarded by respondents in academic year 2011/12 were awarded to men and 48% to women.
• 17% of graduates of U.S.-based PSM programs were international students.
• Among U.S. citizens and permanent residents, 23% of PSM graduates in 2011/12 were underrepresented minorities.
• Biotechnology and computer/information sciences awarded 42% of all PSM degrees awarded: 22% and 20%, respectively.
• Men earned the majority of the PSM degrees awarded in chemistry and physics, geosciences and GIS, other interdisciplinary sciences, bioinformatics/computational biology, and mathematics and statistics.
• Women earned the majority of the degrees granted in medical-related sciences, biology/biotechnology, and “other interdisciplinary” fields.

The report is available in pdf format at cgsnet.org and at sciencemasters.com.

Leaders of the graduate education community provide insight on the time-to-degree and career paths offered by doctoral programs. 

CGS is interviewed by the New York Times about how escalating costs of education, the financial crisis, and new barriers to borrowing are changing the calculus for prospective graduate students.