Internal Deadlines for Fellowship Submissions 

To apply to a fellowship you must adhere to our guidelines regarding internal deadlines. All application materials must be vetted by the Office of Sponsored Research prior to submission via our digital platform, Weill Research Gateway. Non-scientific materials must be uploaded 7 business days prior to the funding agency’s deadline and the complete application must be uploaded 2 business days prior to the funding agency’s deadline.

Weill Cornell Graduate School Fellowship Award Policy

While WCGS guarantees funding for all students, we strongly encourage our students to apply for external funding. Having a fellowship during graduate study will make a student more competitive when applying for positions after graduation. As an incentive, WCGS issues an annual cash award, officially called the “Fellowship Award,” to each student who receives a fellowship, scholarship, or grant from an external funding agency’s competitive award program.

Eligibility         

1. Funding source must be external to WCGS

• Only individual competitive fellowships, scholarships, diversity supplements, or research grants from external agencies are eligible for a Fellowship Award.
• Awards internal to WCGS and its Tri-Institution affiliates, including Weill Cornell Medicine, Memorial Sloan Kettering and Rockefeller University, are ineligible. Examples of such ineligible awards include: WCGS Fellowship Award and the MSK Merit Fellowship
• If a student declines an eligible fellowship (e.g., NSF GRFP, F31, etc.) to accept an ineligible internal grant, they will continue to receive the fellowship award under the terms of the initial eligible award for the period of the internal grant while student is at WCGS.

2. Funding must be granted directly from the funding agency to an individual student

• Institutional training grant appointments to T32, CTSC TL1, and R25 grants are ineligible

3. Funding source must provide funds that replace costs otherwise paid by the advisor or the university

• Fellowships, scholarships, or grants must provide funds in at least one of the following categories: stipend, tuition, or student fees.
• If fellowships, scholarships, or grants only provide funds for lab supplies and/or travel, they are ineligible.

WCGS reserves the right to determine the eligibility of a fellowship, scholarship, or grant for the Fellowship Award.

Amount

Eligible students can receive up to $5,000 per year.  A recipient continues receiving the Fellowship Award each year the fellowship, grant, or scholarship is active. The Fellowship Award amount is determined by the dollar amount of the eligible funding source that covers the annual student stipend and the annual total amount of funding.

• If the stipend awarded by an eligible funding source is greater than 50% of WCGS studend stipend, the amount of Fellowship Award per year is $5,000. 
• If the stipend awarded by an eligible funding source is less than 50% of WCGS studend stipend, the amount of Fellowship Award per year is 10% of the annual total of the stipend, tuition, and student fee support from the external award, up to $5,000.

Distribution

WCGS issues the total annual Fellowship Award amount two times each year. The timing of distribution is determined by the start date of the eligible funding source.

• If the funding source is activited November - May, the Fellowship Award check is distributed in June
• If the funding source is activited June - October, the Fellowship Award check is distributed in November

The cash bonus comes in the form of direct deposit (i.e., ACH) or physical check. It is not considered compensation; it does not appear on W-2 or 1099-misc forms and is not reported to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).

Questions about the Fellowship Award?

Please contact Herminio Quiñones (heq4001@med.cornell.edu) or Dikaury Hernandez-Guner (dih3001@med.cornell.edu) for any inquiries or questions.