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The Department of English currently has available twenty-one
Teaching Fellowships, one Research Fellowship, and one Dissertation
Fellowship. These Fellowships are awarded on the basis of merit.
Fellowships include tuition, certain fees, and a stipend. The
stipend for 2004-2005 is $10,081. Further details about the fellowships
are outlined below.
Another form of financial assistance is available through Tuition
Remission Scholarships. Awarded on the basis of merit, these scholarships
pay the full or partial tuition for three to nine credits of course
work per semester. Such scholarships are renewable for up to two
years providing students make satisfactory progress in their program.
Applicants may specify on application for admission whether they
wish to be considered for a Teaching Fellowship, Research Fellowship,
Tuition Waiver Scholarship, or any combination. Any applicant who wishes to be considered for financial aid must have all application materials in on or before February 1.
Teaching Fellowships
Students seeking the master’s degree may hold a Teaching
Fellowship for two years, and those seeking the doctorate for
four years, providing students make satisfactory progress in the
program.
In order to provide students with solid training and ample opportunity
to teach independently without creating an overwhelming workload,
a tier system has been developed for our fellowship program. The
following guidelines are typical for teaching fellows, but because
students have varying strengths and experience, adjustments are
often made to the tier system with the approval of the Director
of Freshman English and the Director of Graduate Studies.
Training for Teachers
The Center for Teaching Excellence at Duquesne University offers
a three-day workshop to all new teaching fellows, usually the
week before the fall semester is scheduled to begin. Besides providing
new teaching fellows with books and articles relevant to teaching
at the college level, this workshop covers important advice for
teachers such as how to promote classroom discussion.
The Director and Assistant Director of Freshman English also
offer a workshop before classes begin that is designed specifically
for English Teaching Fellows.
All first year fellows must complete a year-long course on Teaching
College Writing.
New Teaching Fellows with little or no teaching experience will
spend their first semester co-teaching a freshman writing class
with a more experienced teacher/mentor.
Teaching workshops for the English department are held during
the academic year. These sessions are usually led either by English
faculty or teaching fellows, and the topics may cover anything
from dealing with plagiarism to creating a teaching portfolio.
The Center for Teaching Excellence also offers workshops regularly
during the school year.
Teaching Opportunities and Responsibilities
Typically, teaching fellows teach one section of freshman writing
in the fall semester and one section of introduction to literature
in the spring semester. Department guidelines are provided for
each course. The introductory literature courses are structured
around theme-based clusters; sections are taught independently,
but the cluster group of teachers provides a forum where methods
and ideas may be exchanged. In addition:
First Year Teaching Fellows will serve five hours per
week as tutors in the Writing Center, where they will tutor
students one-on-one.
Second and Third Year Teaching Fellows will spend five
hours per week doing research for a faculty member, usually
in a field that intersects with the student’s interests.
Fourth Year Teaching Fellows may take advantage of various
opportunities including:
Serving as Assistant Director of Freshman
English: each year, one fellow is selected among applicants
to run the Writing Center and work with the Director of Freshman
English.
Serving as a mentor to a new teacher: usually in the
fall semester, this position involves co-teaching a section
of freshman composition and advising the first year fellow.
Serving as Cluster Leader: this involves developing a
theme for the introductory literature course and leading a group
of teaching fellows who will base their sections on that theme.
Co-teaching upon invitation an upper-level class with
a member of the English faculty.
Teaching advanced writing and sophomore/junior level
survey courses.
Every effort is thus made to provide graduate students with teaching
and leadership opportunities that will prepare them for future
academic work.
Research Fellowship
The student will work closely with a faculty member, conducting
research on a full-time basis. This fellowship is renewable for
up to two years providing the student makes satisfactory progress
in the program. Master’s students may renew the fellowship
as a teaching fellowship after the first year of research, and
doctorate students may renew the fellowship as a teaching fellowship
after either the first or second year of research.
Dissertation Fellowship
Doctoral students who have an approved dissertation proposal and
are in the early stages of work on the dissertation may be eligible
for the dissertation fellowship. Priority will be given to students
who have a particularly strong overall record in the areas of
teaching, scholarship, and service; who have made sustained progress
through the Ph.D. program; and who have demonstrated a commitment
to Duquesne University’s mission of Education for the Heart,
Mind, and Soul.
One of the goals of the dissertation fellowship is to enable
a student to dedicate a significant amount of attention to the
dissertation and, hopefully, complete the dissertation by the
end of the academic year in which the student receives the award.
Another goal of the fellowship is to allow the student the opportunity
to design and teach an upper division course in her/his area(s)
of expertise. The student will work with a faculty mentor during
the Fall semester to design the course (in consultation with both
the Undergraduate and Graduate Directors) and will then teach
the course during the Spring semester. The student will also present
her/his dissertation work to the department in the form of a Colloquium.
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