Endowment to enhance graduate college scholarships

The UTRGV Graduate Select Scholarship became available for the first time this spring to newly admitted accelerated online and traditional graduate students.

Funds from the $5 million Rio-South Texas Education and Community Development Foundation endowment will be used to enhance the scholarship for students in certain fields. 

According to an email sent to the campus community on Dec. 15, the funds will be designated for graduate students in the fields of agriculture, food and natural resources, business, finance, marketing, education, health sciences, information technology, manufacturing and STEM. 

The scholarship priority deadline for the spring semester was Jan. 7. Students may apply for the scholarship depending on availability of funding until today. The Summer I & II priority deadline is April 15 for traditional graduate students and March 1 for accelerated online programs. 

Graduate students must be enrolled a minimum of six hours or three hours per module for the award semester. Students must also have a minimum 3.0 institutional GPA to maintain eligibility for their subsequent awarded semester/module. The award consists of a one-time, up to $1,000 scholarship for one academic year, according to the UTRGV Scholarships and Enrollment Communication website. 

Sandra Hansmann, interim dean of the Graduate College, said the university will support as many students as possible with this award. 

“[President Guy] Bailey is just deeply committed, as is [Janna] Arney, as is this office and this scholarship office … to easing the financial burden of attending graduate school,” Hansmann said. “And we’re really excited about being able to offer this.”

The decisions are made by a review committee, which will look at the different criteria and factors that the student submitted, including a personal statement, a short essay and GPA. 

“We want the students who qualify for this scholarship to have it applied to their Spring ’22 account,” Hansmann said. “So, the reviews should go quickly [Jan. 10]. And decisions, I don’t have an exact date. The decision should be made pretty quickly so this can be applied to the accounts of the students who do receive the funds.”

The Rio-South Texas Education and Community Development Foundation’s mission is “to ensure residents acquire skills and knowledge and have access to economic opportunities to enable them to pursue meaningful careers and live prosperous lives in Rio South Texas,” according to its website.

Regarding the $5 million endowment, Hansmann said it is an incredible gift to the university. 

“The endowment itself is considered like the principal gift and the amount of money that’s awarded from that toward these scholarships is actually the interest that is earned off that principal amount,” Hansmann said. “So, every year it generates this additional interest and gives us the ability to award, sometimes, differing amounts of money, depending on the interest that turns on that principal amount.”

Devon Bradley, a graduate student, applied for the Dean’s Scholarship in 2020, which is similar to the UTRGV Graduate Select Scholarship.  

The amount of the award is the same, but the criteria is different, according to Hansmann. 

“With the select scholarship, we’re really taking this important holistic look at the students and asking them about how they contribute to research, to creativity, to personal professional development and to leadership as a whole during their graduate studies,” Hansmann said. “That’s pretty unique and different from what we have under the dean’s scholarship.”

Bradley said the process to apply for the Dean’s Scholarship is straightforward. 

“They let me know, maybe like a week before classes started,” she said. “They were quick to communicate with me.”

She said the university receiving the $5 million endowment is a fantastic opportunity. 

“Coming from a different university and then coming back to the Valley, it’s good to see money going into the university system that’s doing so much for the Valley,” Bradley said. 

For graduate students who are interested in applying for any scholarships, she advises them to not let their imposter syndrome psych them out from applying to opportunities that come up.

“Because speaking from experience, I was scared to apply for the scholarship because I didn’t think I was going to get it,” Bradley said. “And just don’t let your doubts psych you out from doing opportunities that speak to you.”

For more information on the UTRGV Graduate Select Scholarship, visit the Graduate Scholarships UTRGV page.