CSStipendRankings: Frequent-Asked Questions

Where is the data from? Is it accurate?

The ranking is based on user-submitted or estimated information, which (like other rankings) may be subjective, inaccurate, or out-of-date, despite the best efforts of its volunteers to ensure accuracy. Depending on your personal situation, your actual income or living costs may vary.

What's the definition of majority?

Our current definition of majority is at least 80% of enrolled PhD students. In the case of summer funding, it means 80% of students that stay in the department during the summer performing research or teaching duties.

How does the data submission system work? How do you collect the stipend for the majority?

First, users submit a stipend that most people around them receive, and we will use this number as the number for the "majority". Then, if anyone believes that the number does not match their experience (i.e., most people they know receive less than that number), we will create a survey and put it on the website. We will ask students in the department to fill the survey, and calculate the "majority" stipends based on the survey result. If the numbers from different sources show fundamental differences, we will temporarily remove the department from the ranking during the survey.
In addition, departments may also choose to submit official figures, which we will present on the website.

Why do you choose the 80% minimum instead of median or mean?

We choose to do so for two reasons:

• Most submitters (e.g., PhD students) do not know the average or mean stipend for the whole department. Such information can only be collected with the help of the department and is not always available.
• Prospective students are interested in the minimum stipend amount they can expect - they want to know what is really unlikely to happen. While the offer letter says a minimum guaranteed amount, in practice, they may get more than that amount because of summer funding, etc. We believe an 80% minimum is a reasonable number to address this concern.

Why do you have the no-guarantee label? Why is my department associated with this label?

We believe that asking people to do a PhD without providing financial supports (e.g., tuition waiver and stipend) is not moral. Therefore, we will add such label to any department if anyone can demonstrate such department does not guarantee financial support for at least a subset of their PhD students. This label will be kept until the department proves such support is guaranteed (i.e., via an official letter with department letterhead and signatures).

Why MIT Living Cost Calculator?

We have received a lot of comments that the living cost calculated by the MIT Living Cost Calculator does not really reflect the real living cost in multiple areas. We are considering alternative metrics and data sources. If you are aware of something we can use, please feel free to submit issues or pull requests on GitHub. We are also aware that while the MIT Living Wage Calculator is useful for comparing costs of living across the country, it has its limitations. There are two issues flagged by our users:

• Data is often unavailable for the precise district in which the university is located. In such cases, we use data for the county or wider metro area. This often makes places look more affordable than they actually are. For instance, UC San Diego is located in La Jolla, one of the most expensive districts in the US, but we resort to using figures for the wider San Diego county. Same goes for Westwood (UCLA) vs. LA County, Princeton vs. Mercer County, etc.
• The Calculator states that the estimates are what is required "to cover the costs of their family's basic needs where they live". However, how much one needs to sustain onself is subjective, and users have reported that they can live on much less.

Why is health insurance included in fees?

Many universities provide department-paid health insurance. Hence, we include any out-of-pocket costs as part of fees to make a fair comparison.

I'm paying my students 40h/week during the summer, but the number on the website does not reflect that.

The number is based on (1) funding guarantees and (2) what the majority of students get. The 40h/week summer funding is either not guaranteed, or not the most common case in your department.

The number is wrong because it does not show the stipends for the majority. What should I do?

Please open an issue. We will create a questionnaire to collect data, and you will be asked to forward it to students in your department. We will update the number after we collect enough responses and make the redacted raw data available.

Can I contribute? How?

Everyone is welcomed to submit patches or report the stipend via pull requests. Another option to submit valuable datapoints is through this Google Form. Also, feel free to submit issues on GitHub.

What's your plan for the future? Will X, Y, and Z be added?

We have a list of items that we plan to prioritize in our efforts to improve this website. All contributions are welcomed. Please leave us a message if you want to implement one of these features. The following is the ranked order of importance:

• Gathering data for summer funding guarantees. We plan to incorporate a feature that allows users to exclude non-guaranteed funds when calculating the stipends.
• Add alternative sources of living cost. In the future, users should have the ability to choose between different sources of living cost while ranking.

Other functionalities will not be added.

Why don't the maintainers respond to my email?

We believe issues and comments should be discussed and resolved publicly on GitHub for transparency. If you believe any data is inaccurate or have additional comments, please open an issue or a pull request. The maintainers will not respond to private messages sent to their personal or university accounts regarding this website.

How can I make my department verified and obtain that coveted checkmark?

You may create an issue or fill this Google Form with a redacted document showing the stipend. We currently accept the following documents:

• Official letters on department letterhead and signed by department staff or faculty in charge, showing the exact amount of stipends that at least 80% of students get, and the exact percentage of students getting at least that amount of stipends.
• An offer letter from the department, showing the stipend amount. If the offer letter does not mention summer funding, only the non-summer part will be verified. Any personal information may be redacted.
• A payroll record or a W2 for the previous year. Any sensitive information should be redacted.

Why does my department have a gray checkmark instead of a blue one?

In most cases, this is because only the semester stipends are verified, and summer stipends are not guaranteed. You will need to verify the summer stipend seperately.

Why is the stipend "NaN"?

This is because we don't know whether summer funding is guaranteed or the exact amount of summer funding in the department. Please submit a pull request or open an issue if you have access to more accurate information.