Microsoft Research Ph.D. Fellowship (Fall 2016)
Department Deadline: 9/28/2016
External Deadline: 10/10/2016
See: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/academic-program/phd-fellowship-program/
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/academic-program/phd-fellowship-program/#faq
Microsoft is inviting applications for two-year fellowships from outstanding PhD students. Fellowships will be granted by Microsoft Research at the discretion of Microsoft. The Fellowship covers tuition and fees, provides a stipend ($28,000), provides a travel allowance ($4,000), and comes with a salaried internship offer. See "Provisions of the Award" at the first link for more information.
Students must be in the second or third year of an eligible PhD program in the fall semester of 2016. International students (non-U.S. citizens) are eligible.
A maximum of three candidates per department may be nominated.
Please ensure that the following materials are submitted by 5 pm on 9/28/2016 to Colin Robertson (colinr@illinois.edu, 2252 SC):
1) Your CV/resume.
2) Your thesis proposal. This year, Microsoft has not posted a recommended length. In past years, they recommended no more than 5 pages.
3) Thesis proposal or research statement, not to exceed five pages (plus references).
3) One (1) page summary of the thesis proposal or research statement.
4) Have your adviser submit a letter of recommendation.
4 5) Ask 2 additional letter writers to submit letters of recommendation. Letters should be from established researchers who are familiar your research. At most 1 letter may be from a Microsoft employee.
Note: Electronic documents are preferred and should be submitted as PDFs, Word documents, or plain-text files. Letters of recommendation should be sent from the letter writer directly to colinr@illinois.edu. Students, please include your netid in your file names. I recommend that students submit their CVs and statement(s) to their letter writers at least a week prior to the deadline.
Note: Materials should be submitted to Colin Robertson, not Microsoft. However, if chosen as one of the department's nominees, be aware: "Applications submitted to Microsoft will not be returned. Microsoft cannot assume responsibility for the confidentiality of information in submitted applications. Therefore, applications should not contain information that is confidential, restricted, or sensitive. Microsoft reserves the right to make public information from applications that receive awards, except those portions containing budgetary or personally identifiable information."