Financial Assistance

We encourage you to start your financial aid research early to maximize your options. For your convenience, we have provided a few resources for those students entering the MSDS program in need of financial assistance and funding opportunities. We encourage all of our students to visit the Costs & Funding page on the Graduate School site.

MSDS offers tuition support for:

• Recent UM alumni (through UAccelerate)
• Graduates of Miami Dade College
• Fulbright scholars
• Veterans and their families
• UM employees and dependents (tuition remission)

Our pledge is to provide partial tuition waivers to ALL accepted students who are not receiving full funding from outside sources. Tuition waivers are, essentially, tuition discounts, and the amount varies by semester, but typically ranges from 20-30%. Both international and domestic applicants are eligible for tuition waivers, unless you are receiving funding from an external source. It is important to discuss these options with the admissions officer. Please indicate on your application if you would like to be considered for financial aid. No additional documentation is needed.

Recent graduates of the University of Miami who apply to the MSDS program have the opportunity to receive tuition waivers for up to 40% of their graduate study (12 credits of a 30-credit program) if they attend full time. Students can email the MSDS admissions officer at MSDSadmissions@miami.edu for eligibility criteria.

The University of Miami is committed to supporting local talent. To that end, we have collaborated with Miami Dade College (MDC) to establish an articulation agreement that allows qualified MDC graduates with a Bachelor of Science in Data Analytics to receive a 50% in tuition waivers to complete 30 graduate level credits and earn their master’s degree in one calendar year, if enrolled full time.  Click here for more information.

MAIA supports students who apply through the Fulbright Program, which provides grants to individuals from other countries for graduate study in the United States. Partial tuition waivers are offered and, on rare occasions, a student can be supported through a full scholarship.

Yellow Ribbon Program - The University of Miami is an active participant in the Yellow Ribbon GI Education Enhancement Program. This provision of the post 9/11 GI Bill helps cover the expenses of earning a master's degree. Opportunities for study are available for active-duty personnel as well. Veterans of the U.S. Armed Forces are encouraged to visit the official site for the program.

Tillerman Scholar Program - Scholarship for Service (SFS) is a unique program designed to recruit and train the next generation of information technology professionals, industrial control system security professionals, and security managers to meet the needs of the cybersecurity mission for federal, state, local, and tribal governments. This program provides scholarships for up to three years of support for cybersecurity undergraduate and graduate (MS or PhD) education. The scholarships are funded through grants awarded by the National Science Foundation. In return for their scholarships, recipients must agree to work after graduation for the U.S. government in a position related to cybersecurity for a period equal to the length of the scholarship.

MSDS participates in UM’s Tuition Remission program for eligible UM employees.  For more information, please visit https://my.hr.miami.edu/benefits-and-wellness/work-life/tuition-benefits/index.html

Generation Google Scholarship - The Generation Google Scholarship was established to help aspiring computer scientists excel in technology and become leaders in the field. Selected students will receive $10,000. Scholarships will be awarded based on the strength of each candidate's impact on diversity, demonstrated leadership, and academic background. The program is open to qualified students who meet all the minimum qualifications and Google strongly encourages people who identify as part of historically underrepresented groups, including Black/African American, Hispanic/Latinx, American Indian, or Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander, to apply. As part of the scholarship, students will be invited to attend the summer Google Scholars’ Retreat.

Strong Analytics - Strong Analytics, a data science consulting and machine learning development firm, is offering a $1,000.00 scholarship to secondary and post-secondary students interested in pursuing a career in data science.

Women Techmakers Scholars Program - Through the Women Techmakers Scholars Program - formerly the Google Anita Borg Memorial Scholarship Program - Google is furthering Dr. Anita Borg’s vision of creating gender equality in the tech industry by encouraging women to excel as active participants and leaders in the field. This scholarships awards $10,000.00 and the chance to attend Google Scholars Retreat in Mountain View, CA. Applicants must be female, full-time graduate student in the U.S. or Canada studying computer science or a related field, including data science. Applicants must also have a strong academic background and demonstrate strong leadership skills.

ACM SIGHPC / Intel Computational & Data Science Fellowship - The Association for Computing Machinery's (ACM) Special Interest Group on High Performance Computing (SIGHPC) partners with Intel to provide the Computational & Data Science Fellowship worth $15,000.00 annually to master's or doctoral students conducting research with large-scale big data. Eligible nominees will be females or members of racial minority groups who have completed less than half of their computing degrees at accredited U.S. colleges.

Department of Energy Computational Science Graduate Fellowship - The U.S. Department of Energy offers up to full tuition support for those pursuing an advanced degree in applied mathematics, statistics or computer science with research interests that help use emerging systems more effectively. Students must agree to conduct reearch in areas of interest to the DOE full-time in the summer and part-time during the school year that focuses on issues in high-performance computing as a broad enabling technology and not on a particular science or engineering application. 

For additional information about funding your education through student loans, please visit the Office of Financial Assistance.