Chancellor’s Doctoral Incentive Program (CDIP)

CDIP facilitates the success of doctoral students by formalizing a mentoring relationship with a CSU tenured/tenure track faculty member. Through collaborative teaching, research, and service activities, faculty mentors will: 

• Support the CDIP fellows’ successful completion of their doctoral studies; 
• Develop the CDIP fellows’ potential for employment in an instructional faculty position at a CSU. 

More information about the CDIP faculty mentor’s role can be found on the CSU website, under Mentorship.

Through CDIP grants, we aim to support the collaborative activities of CDIP fellows and their faculty mentors. Fellows will have the opportunity to use grant funds to further their doctoral training and to attend professional conferences and workshops: 

• Mini-Grant Program funds fellows up to $2,500 for collaborative activities and research-dissertation activities, including: research supplies, small equipment, computer programs, software, books, journal subscriptions and research related travel.
• Travel Grant Program funds fellows and their CSU mentors up to $1,500 each for travel to participate in professional meetings, conferences and workshops.
• Dissertation Fellowship funds fellows up to $5,000 to support doctoral studies completion in the final year of the dissertation. 

Optional Financial Loan

CDIP offers optional loans up to $10,000 per year, with a maximum amount of $30,000. This is a private loan and interest is charged:

• Repayable over a 15-year period commencing one year after completion of, or withdrawal from, full-time doctoral study;
• Forgivable at the rate of 20% for each year of full-time postdoctoral teaching employment in the CSU or 10% for each year of half-time postdoctoral teaching employment in the CSU. The amount forgiven is considered income, and will be taxed. 

Acceptance into the program and/or receipt of a loan or other financial support through this program and completion of the doctorate does not in any way guarantee employment as a faculty member at a CSU campus or obligate the recipient to accept such employment, if applied for and offered.

The CDIP is intended to support doctoral students interested in joining the CSU as instructional faculty. As such, students who meet ONE of the following criteria are eligible to apply: 

• New or continuing full-time doctoral students currently enrolled in an accredited program in the U.S.
• Undergraduate and master’s level graduate students in the process of applying to accredited doctoral programs in the U.S. (To be awarded a fellowship, applicants must be accepted into a doctoral program by May 31st.)
• Students enrolled full-time in doctoral programs who hold full-time or part-time lecturer appointments in the CSU are eligible and encouraged to apply. (Probationary and tenured faculty members in the CSU are not eligible, regardless of their status in a doctoral program.)
• Applicants must identify a tenured/tenure-track CSU faculty member to serve as mentor. 

Describe your qualifications for the Chancellor’s Doctoral Incentive Program. The statement should be limited to three single-sided pages and should address how the following have contributed to your commitment to become a CSU faculty member:

• academic preparation (e.g., academic achievements, awards, honors, and fellowships);
• professional experiences in teaching and research;
• motivation and interest in becoming a university professor (both as a teacher and a fellow);
• connection to the CSU (e.g., former/current CSU student or lecturer, knowledge of the CSU mission and role in preparing California’s workforce);
• dedication and ability to educate a diverse student body.

Please note: Students from a professional and/or online doctoral degree program (see Participant Eligibility) must address in their Qualifications and Motivation Statement their professional goal as a university faculty member. This also needs to be addressed in the mentor’s letter of recommendation.

Sample Statements: Sample 1 | Sample 2

Note: The samples indicate the range of styles, content and format that CDIP applicants use in the Qualifications and Motivation Statement attachments. All identifying information has been removed from these actual submitted statements.

Applicants to the program must have a CSU faculty mentor. The faculty mentor must be full-time tenured/tenure-track CSU faculty member. The objectives of the mentor/student interactions are to assist the student in his/her doctoral program, to help the student understand the workings of higher education institutions and the faculty labor market specific to particular disciplines, and to aid the student in the development of skills relevant to success as a CSU tenure-track faculty member. Please see faculty mentor for more information about CDIP faculty mentor’s role and eligibility.

Faculty mentor and applicant are required to jointly develop a written plan of support describing how they intend to maintain communication and collaborate. The plan should describe clearly defined activities with a timeline that is designed to assist the applicant through his/her doctoral studies. The quality of this support plan is critically important in the application selection process.

The contents of the plan may vary depending on the prior contact that the applicant may have had with the faculty and the extent to which he/she is acclimated to the demands of a doctoral program and the expectations of future faculty in the CSU. Detailed instructions can be found in the ​CDIP Application Guidelines under Competition files on InfoReady.

Samples for Plan of Support: Sample 1 | Sample 2

Note: The samples indicate the range of styles, content and format that CDIP applicants use in the Collaborative Plan of Support attachments. All identifying information has been removed from these actual submitted statements.

Two current professional letters of recommendation are required with this application, addressing: 

• The quality of applicant’s proposed plan of study (including the quality of the institution and department where applicant intends to pursue his/her doctoral degree)
• The applicant’s potential to succeed as a doctoral student and be hired as a CSU tenure-track instructional faculty (particularly important for professional and/or online doctoral degree program applicants)
• The applicant’s experience and motivation in educating a diverse student body in the CSU 

References should include the reference’s name, address, email, and telephone number. One of the letters must be from the applicant’s CSU faculty mentor, which should also describe the mentor’s approach to mentoring graduate students and, if available, successes with guiding past students through their doctoral education and faculty job search. If applicant is currently enrolled in a doctoral program, The other letter must be from a faculty member at that institution. 

The faculty mentor should provide the student applicant, for inclusion with his/her application, a copy of a recent tenure-track faculty position announcement in the student’s general field of study that has been posted at a CSU campus. The purpose of the job posting is to provide evidence that the CSU has recently sought to hire individuals in the field/specialization pursued by the applicant. The existence of a job posting in the student’s field does not imply or guarantee that similar jobs will be available when the participant applies for employment in the CSU. However, the lack of a relevant job posting in recent years may indicate that there is little demand for faculty in the field pursued by the student.