The Georgetown campus has nearly as many countries represented in its student body as the WTO has members, but financing a Georgetown education can be more difficult for foreign students, especially those in graduate programs, than for their domestic counterparts.
Full-time tuition for the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences is $13,764 per semester for a full load of 12 or more credits. Part-time students pay $1,147 per credit. To help cover this cost, many students must turn to financial aid.
According to the Dean of the Office of Student Financial Services Patricia McWade, financial aid for the graduate school comes from two distinct sources. Approximately 60 percent of financial aid for graduate students in the School of Arts and Sciences comes from a combination of Georgetown and private aid, including merit-based scholarships and department-distributed fellowships. The remaining 40 percent of the aid is from the federal government, mostly in the form of need-based, long-term loans.
Federal support, however, is available only to US citizens and permanent residents. It is specifically denied to foreigners with visas of the type that are usually issued to foreign exchange students. This makes it very difficult for international students to afford the steep tuition costs at most American universities.
The problem is not unique to Georgetown. Only 15 to 25 percent of international students receive aid at Oregon’s Reed College, while Johns Hopkins’ admissions website warns that “financial assistance for international students who are not permanent residents of the United States is extremely limited.”
Although Georgetown provides the Pedro Arrupe, S.J. Scholarship for Peace to suitable applicants from “war-torn” regions, McWade said that this is one of the few.
“There really isn’t much else that’s earmarked just for international students,” McWade said. “International students compete for [merit-based scholarships] just like anybody else.” But while domestic students can fall back on need-based federal financing if they need to, international students do not have this option.
In some departments, this is not a problem. According to President of the Graduate Student Organization Sharyn Coffey (GRD ‘07), students accepted to graduate programs in most science departments are generally given full scholarships and a stipend for living, regardless of whether or not they are international students. According to Coffey, graduate students are also expected to work for their fellowships.
“It’s most common here at Georgetown that if you are offered a fellowship you will be a teaching assistant or research assistant,” she said.
In other departments, however, the aid is much less generous. International students are ineligible for low-interest federal loans and must turn instead to private loans, most which are expensive or require a co-signature by an American citizen.
Canadian citizen Hugo Maureira (GRD ‘07), who did not receive any aid from the History department, said that his education is “entirely self-funded.” Maureira depends on a complex private loan agreement available to Canadian citizens to finance his education, but is upset at its limitations.
“The real problem is the summer,” Maureira said. He can only work 20 hours a week because of his visa, hardly enough to support himself and his wife.
