Current Students

Fellowships

The most commonly applied-for fellowship is the NSF GRFP, which offers financial support for three years of graduate school and prestige on your CV. You may apply once as an undergraduate senior or once in grad school, either in your first or second year. There can be some strategy in deciding which year to apply, so it is best to consult your advisor about this.

Another popular fellowship is the NDSEG award from the DoD, which offers similar support to the NSF GRFP. It is slightly more competitive, and the proposed research must have connections to DoD efforts, but the application is very similar in structure to the GRFP so it is easy to recycle materials and apply for both. A benefit of the NDSEG is that there are no restrictions on how many times you can apply during grad school.

For any government fellowship, you must be a U.S. Citizen to apply. Applications are typically due in October (GRFP) and November (NDSEG).

The Quantum Foundry also offers three-year fellowships as part of their graduate trainee program. Of course, your research must be very involved with the Foundry's goals, and the decision to apply should be discussed with your advisor.

Once you have drafts of your application essays, make a free appointment to go over your drafts via the Graduate Resource Center. Group members who have applied for or won fellowships are also great resources for preparing your best application.

Fellowship Financial Information

The department supplements income to fellowship students. This supplemental income is paid out as W2 income and therefore has a small amount of tax withholdings.
Most of your income, however, which is paid out as fellowship income, will not have tax withholdings. If you are on fellowship, remember to pay estimated quarterly taxes for federal and state income to avoid paying penalty fees! You can add extra witholding on your W2 income through UCPATH as an alternative.
Doing taxes on fellowship becomes annoying and tends to run into grey areas in tax law. A good summary of some of the situations and forms you might need are summarized through this website: http://pfforphds.com/weird-tax-situations-fellowship-recipients/
NSF GRFP recipients ARE allowed to contribute to Roth-IRA retirement accounts. You might have to check with your specific fellowship if you are allowed to contribute, but generally and recently that answer has changed to yes.

Miscellaneous

Purchasing

Purchasing at UCSB is carried out via Gateway. For large dollar amount purchases (more than $10,000 as of July 2021), you'll need to fill out a Form A to include with the requisition. Microsoft Office, MATLAB, Mathematica, and other similar software can be downloaded for free from UCSB with a student license. OriginPro (plotting software) must be purchased periodically, talk to your advisor or group members to learn how to buy it.

TAships

From the Graduate Student Manual: "All Materials PhD students are required to act as teaching assistants for at least one quarter while in residence at UCSB in either Materials courses or within departments providing courses consistent with the student's undergraduate background." In general, these will be assigned to you. If you would like more experience teaching, talk with your advisor to find courses that will balance well with your research and future goals. The university also offers a Certificate in College and University Teaching for doctoral students who wish to demonstrate their devotion and excellence in teaching at the university level.

Salary Throughout PhD

The income provided on your acceptance letter is subject to contract agreements between the UC system and the union for GSRs and TAs (UAW 4811). Before the start of each quarter you will receive a new appointment letter with your updated current salary for the following quarter and appointment percentage. Read your appointment letters carefully to ensure all information is correct, and ensure you sign and return them in a timely manner to avoid delays in pay. You can view your employment information, pay stubs, and tax forms on UC Path.

If you receive a fellowship, your pay may be “topped off” to ensure comparable pay with salaried GSRs - contact the graduate program coordinator for more details.

Grant/Travel Funding Opportunities

Conferences and workshops you'll want to attend are very project-specific. Check with your advisor and groupmates about what conferences they've attended in the past. The GSA offers a travel grant that students are eligible for once per year. There is also a doctoral student grant offered by the Academic Senate that students can apply for after advancing to candidacy. Many entities within UCSB will offer travel grants, often as a one-time thing. Check with the various programs and centers you're associated with (MRL, Quantum Foundry, etc.).

Internships

There are many internships available both during the summer and academic year for grad students. However, companies often prefer longer internships (~6 months) rather than just 3 months during the summer. Talk to your advisor if you are interested in pursuing an internship.

International Students: CPT is required for employment authorization. More information can be found on OISS website: https://oiss.ucsb.edu/curricular-practical-training
For international students interested in internships during the academic year, please contact the Office of International Students and Scholars (OISS) to determine whether the internship satisfies the requirements for curricular practical training (CPT).

Prelim/Qual Committee Tips and Strategies

Prelims and quals are both in presentation format. Prelims are a 40 minute presentation (+ 10pg paper) on a review of the literature and a proposed research idea on a topic tangentially related to your research. Quals are a 40 minute presentation (+ 10pg paper) on the background/current work of your project and proposed thesis research plan. Committees are chosen by you (along with advice from your advisor). The prelim committee is 3 professors including your advisor(s), the qual committee is 4 professors including your advisor(s) and an out-of-department committee member. Practice talks with students in your group are especially instructive towards successful exams. See the handbook for your starting year for more information. Pay attention to deadlines for completing and submitting forms.

Mastering Out

If a doctoral student wishes to leave the program with completion of a Master's degree, they can do so one of two ways. One option involves a thesis (but no defense) approved by a faculty committee of three professors, and the other requires an engineering report approved by a faculty committee of two professors. Specifics are outlined in the Materials GSR Manual.

Other UCSB Resources

The Graduate Division offers a large number of resources on managing your academic career, from academic services to professional development. The Individualized Professional Skills Program (IPS) provides money for graduate students to attend professional development opportunities that may not otherwise be funded by typical travel grants. The Graduate Resource Center also provides many resources and programs for promoting success in graduate school. Check out the Lunch & Learn events to support your peers and consider giving a talk - it is a great way to practice your skills in a casual setting! The Multi-Cultural Center (MCC) creates an inclusive community for students of color and all students to come together around all kinds of events. Check out their lectures and conversation series when you need less science and more culture in your life. UCSB Arts and Lectures brings many renowned artists, speakers, and musicians to campus, and students often get the benefit of highly discounted ticket prices!

Graduation

Congratulations, you’re almost there!

There is a Graduate Division Central Fellowship intended to support students through their final quarter and thesis writing. Applications to the fellowship are submitted via department nomination, typically due ~March for funding during the following academic year. If you think you may need this support, talk to your advisor and the graduate program coordinator ASAP. You will need to prepare application materials such as a written thesis proposal/timeline and a CV.

After discussing general timelines for graduation with your advisor(s), contact the graduate program coordinator to check on degree progress at least a quarter in advance. Your dissertation draft must be submitted 4 weeks in advance of the defense date to your committee. The draft content is intended to be final (pending comments from your committee) although minor formatting changes are permitted after this deadline. The Graduate Division graduation resources includes a useful checklist for filing. The Graduate Division will also do pre-filing checks on your materials to ensure things go smoothly ahead of time. The Materials Department graduation resources, also includes a useful checklist.

Special considerations:
- If you are missing Annual Assessments, you will need to “make it up”, typically by sending your committee a list of your publications and progress for each year in question.
- Committee changes will require a special form through the department

Union Membership

As of 2023, student researchers (including GSRs, Fellows, Trainees) became unionized and in 2024 joined Academic Student Employees (ASEs), Academic Researchers, and Postdocs to form a single unit of UCSB workers, UAW 4811. This means Materials students would be unit members for their entire time at UCSB!

Our union includes all SRs and ASEs across the entire UC system and codifies many rights that were not standardized previously. Learn more about our contract here. Our union contract is effective from January 2023 to May 2025 (2.5 years), when we will elect representatives to bargain with the UC again. The best way to keep and improve these rights is to get involved with our union to enforce our contract, keep our colleagues informed, and plan for long term contract bargaining. There is a monthly Materials Organizing Committee and if you’d like to get involved please fill out this form (no obligation to attend any meetings, just communications!)

Another great way to support our union is to sign up to be a member and agree to pay dues! UAW 4811 dues are 1.44% of wages, deducted with your permission from your paycheck. Your dues are used as such:

The majority of your dues go towards the strike fund which is used to support strikers who have had pay withheld (students during Fall 2022 may remember this came in handy for our five week strike).
The rest of your dues go to staff who support the operations of our union, legal teams who support the mission of our union, and to lobbying efforts to enact policy changes across the nation.
- One example of successful political lobbying from the UAW is the 2017 amendment of the Higher Education Employer Relations Act (HEERA or SB 201), which allowed GSRs to unionize in California for the first time since the UC successfully lobbied the legislature to disallow it in the 1990s!
While our union charges dues, we have also won increases in wages at all income levels that are greater than the amount of dues and far outdo historical pay increases. Studies of unionized versus non-unionized workers find that the weekly earnings of unionized workers outperforms non-unionized workers by more than 20%.