Google US/Canada PhD Fellowship Program

Nurturing and maintaining strong relations with the academic community is a top priority at Google. The Google U.S./Canada PhD Student Fellowship Program was created to recognize outstanding graduate students doing exceptional work in computer science, related disciplines, or promising research areas. Last year we awarded 14 unique fellowships to some amazing students in the US and Canada:

  • Ashton Anderson, Google U.S./Canada Fellowship in Social Computing (Stanford University)
  • Charles Curtsinger, Google U.S./Canada Fellowship in Software Performance (University of Massachusetts Amherst)
  • David Hall, Google U.S./Canada Fellowship in Natural Language Processing (University of California, Berkeley)
  • Chris Harrison, Google U.S./Canada Fellowship in Human Computer Interaction (Carnegie Mellon University)
  • Te-Yuan Huang, Google U.S./Canada Fellowship in Multimedia Networking (Stanford University)
  • Suman Jana, Google U.S./Canada Fellowship in Security (University of Texas at Austin)
  • Jingwan Lu, Google U.S./Canada Fellowship in Artistic Graphics (Princeton University)
  • Tyler Lu, Google U.S./Canada Fellowship in Computational Economics (University of Toronto)
  • James Martens, Google U.S./Canada Fellowship in Machine Learning (University of Toronto)
  • Ankit Singla, Google U.S./Canada Fellowship in Datacenter Networking (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign)
  • Panagiotis Toulis, Google U.S./Canada Fellowship in Statistics (Harvard University)
  • Etienne Vouga, Google U.S./Canada Fellowship in Computer Graphics (Columbia University)
  • Hongning Wang, Google U.S./Canada Fellowship in Search and Information Retrieval (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign)
  • Jianxiong Xiao, Google U.S./Canada Fellowship in Computer Vision (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)

It's an honor to be supporting these future leaders of the field, and we are pleased to once again announce the Google U.S./Canada PhD Fellowship Program for 2013. This highly competitive program will award approximately 12 named fellowships. Past fellowships awarded include:

  • Google Fellowship in Market Algorithms
  • Google Fellowship in Natural Language Processing
  • Google Fellowship in Machine Learning
  • Google Fellowship in Computer Security
  • Google Fellowship in Distributed Computing
  • Google Fellowship in Programming Technology
  • Google Fellowship in Machine Translation
  • Google Fellowship in Speech Technology
  • Google Fellowship in Human Computer Interaction
  • Google Fellowship in Cloud Computing
  • Google Fellowship in Computer Architecture
  • Google Fellowship in Structured Data Analysis
  • Google Fellowship in Search and Information Retrieval
  • Google Fellowship in Energy Aware Computing
  • Google Fellowship in Mobile Computing
  • Google Fellowship in Computer Vision
  • Google Fellowship in Social Computing
  • Google Fellowship in Computer Networking
  • Google Fellowship in Systems Management
  • Google Fellowship in Statistics
  • Google Fellowship in Computer Graphics

Applications are not accepted directly from students. Please contact your department to find out if your university is one of the eligible universities, or to receive additional information.

Fellowship Details

Google will award two-year fellowships consisting of:

  • tuition and fees
  • $33K yearly stipend (paid over 9 months of the academic year)
  • Google Research Mentor
  • third year extension possible at Google's discretion

Eligibility Criteria

In order to be considered for the 2013 Google U.S./Canada PhD Fellowship Program, students must meet the following criteria:

  • Full-time graduate students pursuing a PhD in the research areas represented by the fellowships
  • Must attend one of the eligible schools and universities. Student must remain enrolled in the PhD program or forfeit the fellowship award
  • Must be nominated by their department
  • Must have completed their graduate coursework in the PhD program and be embarking on or continuing their graduate research in the fall of 2013
  • Google employees and family members of Google employees are not eligible
  • Students who are already receiving another fellowship are not eligible

Application Process and Requirements

For each student nomination, the university will be asked to submit:

  • name of fellowship for which student is being considered
  • student CV
  • transcript of current and previous academic records
  • research/dissertation proposal (recommended length 4-5 pages, no longer than 8)
  • 2-3 letters of recommendation from those familiar with the nominee's work (at least one coming from the thesis advisor)

Each eligible university is invited to submit a maximum of two student nominations for fellowship consideration. Please feel free to extend your search to students who may be in other department other than Computer Science but also pursuing their research in the computational sciences. Note that given that the fellowship areas overlap, we may choose a different fellowship for your nomination.

Nominations and applications materials are due February 1, 2013. A nomination process will be available early next year for submissions and eligible schools will receive an e-mail once it has been activated with more instructions.  Committees of distinguished engineers and researchers from within Google will be reviewing all applications. Students may be invited for an in-person interview following the initial review.

Fellowship recipients will be announced by May of 2013. For more information on previous Google Fellowship recipients, please see Google U.S./Canada PhD Fellowship Recipients.

FAQ

How many students may each university nominate?

Each invited university may nominate up to 2 students.

Who should submit the applications?

Students may not submit their own application. Nominations and application materials must be submitted directly by the university.

How should applications be submitted?

A nomination process will be available early next year for submissions and eligible schools will receive an e-mail once it has been activated with more instructions.

Are non-U.S. citizens eligible for a Google Fellowship?

Yes, as long as the other eligibility criteria are met.

Can students apply directly for a fellowship?

No, students must be nominated by an eligible university in order to be considered.

What are the intellectual property implications of a Google Fellowship?

Fellowship recipients are not subject to intellectual property restrictions unless they complete an internship at Google. If that is the case, they are subject to the same intellectual property restrictions as any other Google intern.

Will the fellowship recipients become employees of Google?

No, there will not be any employee relationship between fellowship recipients and Google.

Can fellowship recipients also be considered for the Anita Borg Scholarship?

No, fellowship recipients are not eligible for the Anita Borg Scholarship. For more information, please see the Anita Borg Scholarship Website.

When do the fellowships start?

The 2013 Google U.S./Canada PhD Fellowships will begin in September 2013.

How is the Fellowship given?

Monetary awards will be given directly to the student's university for distribution. The funds are given as an unrestricted gift and overhead should not be assessed against them.

Are there fellowships outside of the United States?

Please see information about our Google European Doctoral Fellowship Programme and China Google PhD Fellowship Program.