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Fellowship Information for Graduate Program Staff

Graduate program coordinators are responsible for managing the allocations provided to them for student support from Graduate Studies as well as any program specific fellowships (endowments). Graduate Studies provides three main allocations to graduate programs for payment via Banner: Graduate Program Fellowship Allocation (GPFA), Supplemental Non-Resident Tuition (SNR), and, for some programs, Master's Enrollment Incentive Program funds (MEI). In addition to these base allocations, each year, programs are encouraged to nominate prospective and continuing students for UC Davis campus-wide internal fellowships. Instructions for nominating students in Slate may be found below.

Types of Allocations

  • Graduate Program Fellowship Allocation Funds 
  • Graduate programs receive an allocation from the Graduate Program Fellowship Allocation Funds (formally called 'Block Grant') to award fellowships to new and continuing students. These funds are restricted for use as stipends (or "living allowance"), tuition & fees or nonresident supplemental tuition (NRST) fellowships. Graduate Program Fellowship Allocation Funds cannot be used to bring students to campus for pre- or post-admissions recruitment visits, research costs, or to fund student appointments, such as research and teaching assistantships. No expectation of research or teaching effort can be tied to a Graduate Program Fellowship Allocation Funds. GPFA funds are primarily allocated based upon student enrollment, but funds are also allocated according to set a of metrics determined by Graduate Studies and endorsed by Graduate Council and the Task Force on Graduate Education.
  • Supplemental Ph.D. Non-Resident Tuition Funds
  • These funds are allocated to programs based upon on the Non-Resident Supplemental Tuition paid for second and third-year international students enrolled in a doctoral or MFA program. NRST paid as part of the GSR buy-down program is not included in this allocation. These funds are subject to the same restrictions and guidelines as GPFA funds with one exception: programs may opt to use these funds to buy-out a regular lecturer or to hire a faculty member to teach a graduate-level course. If your program should choose to pursue this option, please contact gspayments@ucdavis.edu. Please do not hire instructional support staff on the account provided to you by Graduate Studies in GradTrack$.
  • Master's Enrollment Incentive Program
  • For programs that have opted into this program and have increased enrollment over a base year, Graduate Studies will provide you with an allocation in GradTrack$. Please note, your GradTrack$ allocation cannot be used to pay any academic appointments and should only be used for fellowships. More information on this program may be found here.

Paying Program Specific Awards

Most program coordinators will need to enter fellowships from funds that are not allocated by Graduate Studies. These funds may be program specific-funds, such as endowments, or a graduate student may receive an award that will be given directly to the department to award. In order to set up these awards in Banner, please follow the below steps:

Verify Account and Check Student Status

Before a fellowship can be processed in Banner, a Banner Fund Code must be initiated to link the banner payment to the Aggie Enterprise account. For general ledger accounts, the purpose must be "78." In most cases, an account manager will provide you with the appropriate account number. 

This is also a good time to verify that the student you will be paying has signed a fellowship award letter, is in good academic standing and enrolled in at least 12 units. Fellowships will not disburse to students who are not enrolled.

New Account or New Account to Banner?

If a fellowship has never before been paid from an Aggie Enterprise account, you must first submit a request to initiate a new Banner Fund code via the online Graduate Studies Banner Fund Code Request form.  This form requires CAS (aka Kerberos) sign-on. The Aggie Enterprise account must fully approved before a Banner Fund Code can be initiated. If you have access to the GradTrack$ Web Report Tool, you can determine if the account is already set up to a pay fellowship in Banner by using the "Fund Code Details" report. A fund code must exist for each type of fellowship, you wish to pay. For example, there must be a "Tuition and Fee" fund code listed for the account in order to make a fee fellowship.

Existing Accounts

For existing fund codes, each new academic year (starting each July 1st), each fund code must be activated in Banner prior to your use. To activate accounts in Banner for your use, submit the online Graduate Studies Banner Fellowship Allocation Request Form. This form requires CAS (aka Kerberos) sign-on. Up to ten accounts can be activated with each form. If you have more than ten accounts to activate, simply submit additional forms. The dollar amount submitted via this form for each account will populate the GradTracK$ Web Report Tool so you can track your current available balance.