CS-PhD-Application-fee-waivers

Introduction and Background

During the long and stressful process of PhD applications, expensive application fees turned out to be an important factor that impeded me from applying for more programs. Some schools offer application fee waivers. However, as suggested by Prof. Jesse Thomason,

You often can get application fees waived, and requesting waivers should not affect your application. Unfortunately, many schools and departments either intentionally or unwittingly make the procedure for applying for a waiver difficult to untangle.

In addition, sometimes the fee waiver is only available for people with specific citizenship or permanent residency. Therefore, I created this list of application fee waivers for a collection of schools (mostly in North America, in which PhD programs typically require an application fee), hoping that other students can save some time by finding this information.

Although this list notes for CS PhD application fee waivers, most links should be generalizable to a graduate program or at least a graduate program in the School of Engineering or School of Art and Science. People applying for other programs can also look for departmental fee waivers by either searching through the departmental website or messaging the admission office.

Each program will be followed by a link to the fee waiver information page and/or a short message indicating the limitation for application. For some US schools, application fee waivers will only be offered to US Citizens or permanent residents -- this will also be annotated.

If a school is not on the list, it does not necessarily mean that they do not offer application fee waiver. You can find information through search engines, probing into their application pages, or messaging the admission offices.

To add more entries or correct some entries, please submit a PR or open an issue.

You may also be interested in checking out Shaily's Advice Collection, which is an awesome repository that includes all kinds of grad school application resources :)

General Fee Waivers

Some schools offer fee waivers to participants/members of specific programs/organizations. Some of the common programs or organizations are listed here.

GEM Fellowship Program [Link]
Black in AI [Link]
LatinX in AI [Link]
Queer in AI [Link]
Queer in AI Financial Aid/Application Review Program [Link]
oSTEM Grad School Application Funding [Link]

2023 Application Fee Waivers

United States

Stanford Graduate Fee Waivers [Link]
Carnegie Mellon SCS Graduate Application Fee Waiver [Link]
UC Berkeley Application Fee Waiver [Link] Note: Must be a U.S. citizen or permanent resident
UC Berkeley School of Information Fee Waiver [Link] Note: This is for applicants not eligible for general fee waiver.
University of Washington - Paul G. Allen School of CSE [Link] Note: in tab Fee Waivers
MIT Graduate Admission Application Fee Waivers [Link] Note: Non U.S. Citizens/permanent citizens are eligible if they participated in an MIT/OGE-sponsored diversity program in the past five years.
Princeton Application Fee Waivers [Link] Note: Non-U.S. Citizens are eligible to apply for a fee waiver based on participation in a program, but no financial hardship.
UPenn Engineering Application Fee Waivers [Link] Note: Search for fee waiver on this page.
UIUC Graduate Application Fee Waivers [Link] Note: must be U.S. citizens or permanent residents.
Johns Hopkins Whiting School of Engineering [Link] Note: Under Application Fee and Waiver Request
Cornell Graduate Fee Waivers [Link]
UCLA Graduate Education [Link] Note: Non-U.S. Citizens are eligible to apply for a fee waiver based on participation in a program, but no financial hardship.
UCSD Graduate Division [Link] Note: International applicants are not eligible.
UCSD CSE department [Link] Note: DDL Nov 15 2021 This is for those who are not eligible for general fee waiver
UCSC Graduate Application Fee Waiver [Link] Note: Search for Fee Waiver in this page. Must be US Citizen, AB 540, or a Permanent Resident of the United States.
UCI Graduate Admission Fee Waiver [Link] Note: U.S. citizens, permanent residents, and DACA/AB540 eligible only
University of Southern California Viterbi School of Engineering [Link] Note: Request a fee waiver by sending an email with the CV and transcripts to: viterbi.gradprograms@usc.edu.
University of Maryland Graduate School [Link]
Harvard University, the Graduate School of Arts and Science [Link] Note: Under tab How much is the application fee and How can I apply for an application fee waiver
Caltech Graduate Application Fee Waiver [Link] Note: Search for How do I apply for a fee waiver? in this page
Columbia Graduate School of Art and Science [Link]
University of Illinois Chicago [Link] Note: No financial hardship fee waiver.
University of Michigan Rackham Graduate School [Link]
Georgia Institute of Technology [Link] Note: Under Fee Waivers
Purdue University Graduate School Application Fee [Link]
University of Massachusetts Amherst Robert and Donna Manning College of Information & Computer Sciences [Link] Note: Under Application Fee
The Graduate School at UNC-Chapel Hill [Link] Note: Available for ten groups of domestic applicants
UNC-Chapel Hill Computer Science [Link] Note: Available for applicants not eligible for the general fee waiver.
Georgetown University Computer Science [Link] Note: Search for fee waiver
Northeastern University College of Engineering [Link] Note: See the right-hand side: "... graduate student applicants can use fee waiver code NUExperience24. To use the fee waiver..."
NYU Tandon School of Engineering [Link]
University of Massachusetts Amherst CICS [Link] Search for fee waiver
Stony Brook University [Link]
University of Utah Graduate Programs [Link] 0 application fee for domestic applicants, need to email to grad office.
Brown University Computer Science [Link] Search for fee waiver
Cornell University [Link] Note: You can request a fee waiver through the payment page of the online application form.
Columbia University Graduate Engineering [Link]
University of Virginia (School of Engineering and Applied Science) [Link] Note: GRE and standard application fee of $85 will be waived for 2024 admission to all GRADUATE PROGRAMS

Canada

University of British Columbia [Link]
Simon Fraser University [Link] Note: Under PhD, in Application Fee Waiver.