The UW Financial Aid Office strongly encourages you to apply for financial aid if you think you need help paying for your education. There is no “income cutoff” or other simple method of determining whether you will qualify for need-based financial aid.

General eligibility by program:

Residential MLIS: As part of an on-campus program, financial aid for Residential MLIS students may cover tuition, fees, books and supplies, room and board, transportation, and miscellaneous fees. Financial aid is automatically assessed and awarded at 10 credits* for full-time programs.

Online MLIS: As part of an online/off-campus program, financial aid for Online MLIS students is limited to tuition only. Financial aid is automatically assessed and awarded at 5 credits* for part-time programs.

Law MLIS: As part of an on-campus program, financial aid for Law MLIS students may cover tuition, fees, books and supplies, room and board, transportation, and miscellaneous fees. Financial aid is automatically assessed and awarded at 10 credits* for full-time programs.

*Additional aid can be requested if additional credits are taken in a particular quarter. Fill out the Revision Request for Additional Expenses and submit it to the UW Financial Aid Office.

Additional UW resources

• The UW Graduate School Offers grants through the Graduate Opportunities and Minority Achievement Programs (GO-MAP).
• Graduate Funding Information Services (GFIS). Be sure to check out the online workshops for this site.
• UW Employment: Once you are admitted to the UW Information School, you will be able to access employment opportunities on campus. Those will include Teaching Assistant and Research Assistant positions, hourly student positions and part-time jobs. These positions could be within the iSchool, for another academic unit or department on campus or within the UW library system. In addition, once you enroll in classes, you’ll have access to iCareers, our student job database which will allow you to search for part-time and full-time positions in the greater Seattle area.

UW scholarships

MLIS students are eligible to apply for certain scholarships restricted to UW students. Among them:

• The Bonderman Travel Fellowship provides up to $20,000 for students to undertake independent international travel to explore, be open to the unexpected, and come to know the world in new ways. 
• Foreign Language Area Studies Fellowships provide up to $27,500 for students to take advanced training in Canadian, East-, Central-, South-, and Southeast Asian, Middle Eastern, Russian and Eastern European and Western European Area Studies.
• The McKinstry Fellowship provides $10,000 to cover tuition and educational fees for underrepresented MLIS students from Native American, Hispanic American, African American, Asian American and Hawaiian/Pacific Islander heritages.
• UW fellowships and awards: The Office of Fellowships and Awards coordinates and administers regional and federal fellowship and scholarship programs that require Graduate School involvement.

See our full list of scholarship opportunities for MLIS students.