For general financial aid information-especially related to student loans, grants, and scholarships, all students are referred to the ETSU Financial Aids Office. You can get their by clicking on Financial Aids Office.

The faculty in the Counseling Program will do everything we can to facilitate our students receiving tuition scholarships (TS) or graduate assistantships (GA) at the ETSU-Johnson City campus. Jim Bitter is the contact person for students. He is in room 304 of Warf-Pickel Hall, and he can be reached at either Bitterj@etsu.edu or (423) 439-4194.

A tuition scholarship must be assigned starting with the student's first non-summer semester in a Graduate Program. The student may keep the tuition scholarship then until she or he graduates, but it cannot be initially (first) assigned to anyone in her or his second full semester or beyond. A tuition scholarship eliminates all in and out of state tuition in exchange for 8 hours of work per week during the fall and spring semesters. It does not apply to Summer Sessions.

A graduate assistantship may be obtained at any time as long as they are available. A full graduate assistantship eliminates all in and out of state tuition and pays a stipend of approximately $621.00 per month in exchange for 20 hours of work per week during the fall and spring semesters. It does not normally apply to Summer Sessions, and even when work and stipends are continued into the summer, tuition is never waived for the summer-and a student must be enrolled for at least six hours in the summer when on stipend. A half graduate assistantship provides half the benefits for half the service: half of in or out of state tuition is waived and a stipend of approximately $310.50 per month is provided in exchange for 10 hours of work per week during the fall and spring semesters. Half graduate assistantships are never carried over into the summer.

In general, a person from out of state is better off with a tuition scholarship than a half graduate assistantship, because of the full waiver of out-of-state tuition. A full graduate assistantship always provides more than either of the other two, but takes at least twice the time each week in terms of service. At the Counseling Program Admissions Interview, students are given a form to complete in which they can indicate whether they would be interested in either a tuition scholarship or a graduate assistantship (half or full) and also in which they can provide us with information on how to reach them.