I’m really surprised to be writing this. When i started graduate school one of my biggest goals was to get tuition waived somehow. I do believe as an international student your options are limited in terms of funding specifically for a Masters program.

But that doesn’t mean they don’t exist.

I’d also like to preface this by saying that I didn’t look into multiple funding opportunities. I rather chose to focus on the one thing I’m good at and the very thing I did for 3.5 years during my undergraduate degree which was teaching. In 2025, I don’t know many MS students who are able to actively get their research funded but I know multiple schools offer assistantships that waive tuition. A lot of my top choices were already funded programs and I chose University of Michigan because I knew that this was a possibility.

I started by reaching out to my seniors - folks who had completed a year of Masters in terms of how possible it is to actually get a GSI (Graduate Student Instructor) Position. It seemed like UM had a strong bias towards SUGS students especially in the CSE department since these are students who actually took these courses at university, and probably were undergrad TA’s. I also cold messaged a lot of folks on LinkedIn but frankly I didn’t get a lot of advice that helped me.

I met the Chair of our MS program on a whim during a welcome event and tried to maintain that relationship. Even chairs, directors and professors who are higher up in the academic ladder have open office hours so I decided to schedule an appointment to meet him in person.

Before our meeting I rewrote my entire resume. I did have somewhat of an upper hand because I had some teaching experience - I taught 9 terms during my bachelors, was Head TA, worked in curriculum design, worked in enrollment, was a mentor and a Stanford Code in Place section leader. These were one liners buried deep within my one page resume because no industry recruiter seemed to weigh them as much internships. It’s a pity though because I really like to teach.

This is probably the most important takeaway - go talk to professors. If you are unfamiliar with the process, with what they are looking for, how to stand out - this is basically a cheat code to understand the ‘rubric’. I also dropped my resume off to professors which also helped me out though some professors politely declined which I also respect :)

Here is what you can control:

• Getting your name in : go talk to professors, show them you’re interested, show them relevant experience and how much you care. Don’t approach it as oh I want the tuition waiver, but rather that you want to teach! Just by talking to professors and trying to get my name out I was able to get an interview for a course that I did not even apply for.
• Rewrite your CV for all prior teaching experience on TOP - TA, Research, Mentoring, Tutoring anything relevant !
• Ask professors what they look for when they select someone. What is their rubric? We had to make teaching videos for CSE classes and here is what I learnt by talking to professors:
  • Don’t just make a video of you teaching because that’s what everyone does - try simulating a real interaction. I had my brother, mom and friend play the role of a student and we set up ‘office hours’ and I explained to them a question. I also made a video where I had my friend come in with a bug in their code that we debugged together on video.
  • Don’t teach a really easy concept - really understand the material and find a concept that is a pain point.
  • Effort goes a long way. I set up a worksheet, created slides, had a coding playground with a fake project and fake bug. These show real interactions beyond me reading off slides.
• I had two more interviews after I submitted my application - both of which I prepped with the class syllabus, learnt through material, structured answers for why I like to teach and what I do to foster inclusivity. A lot of the answers I had prepared drew my own previous experiences of how I have run lab sessions, exam review sessions and other interactions with students.
• Look beyond your department ! I played it safe w CSE but there are a lot of other departments that hire GSIs and you might be a fit elsewhere. I know students who are CSE hired within other schools like the School of Information or even other Engineering schools for courses that require heavy programming knowledge.

Here is what you cannot control

• Course Enrollment - even if you are the perfect candidate you cannot get hired if the department cannot justify your offer. Targeting larger classes that are required might increase your chances but that means more competition as well.
• If you haven’t taken that class at UM, it is definitely harder because SUGS students could have been IA’s (undergrad TA’s) but it’s not impossible so keep trying!

I’ve linked the teaching video that got me this position - special credits to my family and friends who role played as my fake students.

swap() is my go to example for any Programming 101 :)