Prospective Students

Your personal statement is a key part of your application, giving us insight into who you are, your background, and your goals. While there’s flexibility in what you include, here are some helpful points to guide you:

1. Information About You and Your Background
   Share a bit about yourself—your educational, academic, and work experiences—especially those that relate to your interest in pursuing a PhD. Highlight how these experiences have prepared you for doctoral study and any special skills or interests you’ve developed along the way.
2. Career Goals
   Tell us about your professional aspirations and how earning a PhD in Human Development & Social Policy will help you achieve them. Understanding your goals helps us see how our program fits into your future plans.
3. Research Interests and Experience
   Describe your current research interests and any previous experience with research. This helps us understand your academic focus and potential contributions to the field.
4. Fit with Our Faculty and Program
   We value knowing how your interests align with our faculty’s expertise. We can’t guide you well if we don’t have expertise in your subject matter of interest. We encourage you to review our faculty’s research areas in advance (you can explore them here: FCS Research Areas) and consider which professors’ work resonates with your interests. While you won’t be locked into working with a specific faculty member right away, having an idea of where you might fit helps us envision your place in our community. You can also explore faculty publications on Google Scholar or academic databases, or reach out directly to faculty via email to learn more about their research and discuss common interests.

Finding the right faculty mentor is an important step in your PhD journey. PhD students work closely with a faculty mentor (their committee chair), other faculty members from within the department, and at least one faculty member from outside of the department. Depending on students’ and faculty interest, availability of existing data, and other factors, students may develop their own independent research projects under the oversight of faculty, and/or work with faculty on existing studies. Therefore, understanding the research interests and expertise of our faculty, and whether or not these fit with a prospective student’s own interests, is essential. Here are some ways you can explore whether a faculty member’s expertise matches your research interests:

• Review faculty research areas:  Start by looking at the department’s website, where faculty research interests and current projects are often summarized. This gives you an overview of the kinds of questions and topics they study.
• Read recent publications:  Search for faculty members on Google Scholar or academic databases to read their recent papers. This helps you understand their specific research focus and approach in more depth.
• Reach out directly:  Don’t hesitate to contact faculty members by email to introduce yourself and ask questions about their work. Many professors welcome conversations with prospective students to discuss potential research fit.

Although you don’t have to decide immediately or be locked into one faculty member, it is important that your research interests have overlap with the expertise of our faculty. Your interests may evolve once you start the program, and you’ll have opportunities to explore faculty research before choosing an advisor/committee chair.

When submitting writing samples for our PhD program, it’s important to choose documents that best showcase your research skills, critical thinking, and writing ability. Here are some common types of writing samples that work well:

• Research papers or term papers from your undergraduate or graduate coursework, especially those related to human development, social policy, or related fields.
• Master’s thesis chapters or excerpts if you’ve completed a graduate degree.
• Honor’s thesis or undergraduate research papers, if you have any.
• Published articles or conference papers, if you have any.
• Research proposals or grant applications you’ve written.
• Reports or policy briefs from internships or work experience relevant to the field.
• Literature reviews or annotated bibliographies that demonstrate your ability to synthesize and analyze research.

Try to choose samples that are clear, well-organized, and highlight your ability to engage with research questions and present arguments effectively.

Students admitted to the Human Development and Social Policy graduate program can be offered departmental funding in exchange for their service as teaching or research assistants. This funding includes: 

• Stipends
• Tuition waivers
• Subsidized health insurance

Students who do not receive assistantships may be offered scholarships for either two years for Masters students or three years for PhD students.

Masters students are eligible to receive up to 2 years of funding during fall and spring semesters.

Doctoral students are eligible to receive up to 5 years of funding during the fall and spring semesters (limited to 4 years for those who have completed a previous graduate degree), provided they make satisfactory progress in their academic requirements each year and fulfill the expected duties and obligations of their assigned job.

Funding decisions are based on meritorious achievement without mentioning the application part. 

Each year, during an annual evaluation process, the faculty in the Department of Family & Consumer Studies will assess each student’s performance. Students who exhibit poor performance may be ineligible for funding in later years.

Here are some examples of the kinds of jobs our graduates of our graduate program inHuman Development & Social Policy go into, and how their training makes them prepared for those roles. This can help you picture possible career paths after completing the program.

Graduates from our program work in a variety of settings. Some go into academia; others work in research institutions, government, non‐profits, or policy. Below are some of the job titles our alumni hold, or could hold, along with sectors.

How the PhD Prepares You for These Jobs

Here are some of the skills, experiences, and features of the program that help graduates succeed in these roles:

• Strong research training — you gain experience in quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods; designing studies; analyzing data; writing papers and reports.
• Interdisciplinary grounding — because faculty cover human development, economics, sociology, psychology, etc., you’re able to approach problems from multiple perspectives. That helps in settings where policies intersect different domains.
• Focus on policy relevance — part of the program’s mission is to link human development research with social policy. This means you learn not just theoretical/academic work but also how research informs or evaluates policy and programs.
• Opportunities to engage with non‑academic stakeholders — whether via program evaluation or collaborations with non‑profits or government. Those experiences strengthen your resume if you want non‑academic roles
• Teaching experience – through teaching assistantships and training in pedagogy through the Center for Teaching Excellence

Masters Degree Thesis 

Taylor Holladay (2025, MS) - THE CHARACTERISTICS OF SOCIALLY RESPONSIBLE INVESTORS: A META-ANALYSIS THROUGH THE LENS OF THE THEORY OF PLANNED BEHAVIOR

Annie W Sánchez (2025, MS) - A META-ANALYSIS ON NEIGHBORHOOD DISADVANTAGES ON JUVENILE RECIDIVISM

Emma Maxwell (2024, MS) - FROM PEWS TO POLLS: THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN ADOLESCENT RELIGIOUS INVOLVEMENT AND ADULT POLITICAL PARTICIPATION

Sarah Cochran (2024, MS) - THE SECURITY OF WOMEN AND THE SUCCESS OF STATES

Tania Akter (2024, MS) - DOMESTIC VIOLENCE PERCEPTION AND POLICY: INSIGHTS FROM A SAMPLE OF BANGLADESHI UNITED STATES RESIDENTS

PhD Dissertation

Janae Webb Chandler (2025, PhD) - EXPONENTIAL GROWTH BIAS AND EMERGING ADULTS: A STUDY OF FINANCIAL DECISION-MAKING THROUGH QUALITATIVE AND EXPERIMENTAL APPROACHES

Marin Christensen (2025, PhD) - DID COVID-19 LOCKDOWNS HUMANIZE THE WORKPLACE? UNDERSTANDING MALE EXECUTIVES’  VIEWS ON REMOTE WORK AND FLEXIBILITY POLICIES SINCE COVID-19

Xianghong Joy Qiao (2024, PhD) - NURTURING SOCIOEMOTIONAL WELLNESS AMIDST PARENTAL EXPECTATIONS: INSIGHTS FROM HIGH-ACHIEVING AMERICAN AND CHINESE STUDENTS

Tessa Washburn (2024, PhD) - FAMILY- AND INDIVIDUAL-LEVEL PATHWAYS THAT KEEP GHANAIAN GIRLS IN SECONDARY SCHOOL: A MIXED METHODS STUDY