Assistantships provide students with training and valuable professional experience in higher education work environments. Assistantship duties should not interfere unduly with academic studies, but rather should contribute to students' intellectual growth and degree goals.
Assistantships are considered primarily as a form of financial aid to help graduate students complete graduate school. Compensation includes a stipend and tuition remission.
All assistantships include a stipend, which is intended to help defray the costs of housing, food and transportation. A stipend is a fixed sum of money that is not necessarily based on work performed or hours of work. It is paid on a semimonthly basis (15th day and last day of each month), and is subject to applicable state, federal and local taxes. Stipend amounts vary by discipline and program, as well as by type of assistantship.
Assistantships include full or partial tuition remission. Tuition remission does not cover the cost of various fees attached to tuition. A student who receives tuition remission only (no stipend) does not have a service commitment. Such a student, however, must be enrolled full-time (i.e., at least eight credit hours per semester) in a specific degree program. Historically, in addition to the stipend and tuition remission, we have been able to provide graduate students with a partial health insurance credit of 70% to be applied toward the health insurance plan for graduate students offered through Kent State University. At this point, negotiations regarding student health care coverage have not been completed, and we do not know whether the same partial health insurance credit will be available next year. We will update immediately when this information is available.