Financial Information:
The following section is designed to help you estimate the cost of a year of graduate school at Berkeley and to acquaint you with the resources and options available to help you finance your education.

Numerous programs - from fellowships and grants-in-aid, to loans, research assistantships (GSRs), teaching appointments (GSIs), and subsidized housing and child care - provide ways you can cut the cost of graduate/medical school.  Some of the programs are merit-based and administered through the Graduate Division Fellowship Office;others are need-based and administered through the Graduate Financial Aid Office.

Costs:*
Each spring, the Financial Aid Office for the Berkeley campus computes budgets [click on "Cost of Attendance" on the right-hand side of that page] to help you estimate the average cost for a Joint Medical Program graduate/medical student during the 9-month academic year.  Budgets are revised each year to account .for changes in the cost of living, fees, and tuition.  Fees and nonresident tuition fees are set by the Regents and are subject to change without notice.  Actual JMP fees are shown on the Office of the Registrar's fee schedule [scroll all the way through to get full picture of JMP fees].

The UCB-UCSF Joint Medical Program is a 12 - month program in the first year.  Our students enroll full-time in the second Summer Session, which lasts eight weeks, and take Anatomy with a Radiology correlate, as well as Master's Thesis Seminar.  An additional amount for living expenses and summer session fees should therefore be added to the first-year estimated student budget.

Students in the JMP are also assessed a Professional Degree Fee (charged to all UC medical students) in the second and third year in the Berkeley Program and in the remaining two years at UCSF. 

All JMP students are required to own a networkable home computer or laptop.   After actual matriculation into the JMP, a departmental grant of $2000.00 is available to cover a substantial portion of this cost for those students who must purchase a computer.

Research Grant: Up to a total of $2000 per student, available over the course of your time here. A simple application process takes place each fall and spring. Expenses typically approved include travel costs necessary to carry out the work, costs of developing and producing research materials and of collecting data, and costs associated with analyzing data. As a matter of policy, some sorts of expenses are not covered, e.g. hiring research assistants. Others are covered contingently, e.g. after a requisite amount of data has been collected.

*All fees are subject to change.

Legal Residency and Fees:
Every entering student is classified as a resident or nonresident of California for tuition purposes. Detailed information on establishing residency and documenting financial independence is available from the Office of the Registrar's Legal Residency Unit.

Financial Planning Guide for Graduate Students:
A variety of merit-based awards is available for graduate students. JMP students primarily apply for a Block Grant Fellowship (administered by the JMP), or a Summer Foreign Language and Area Studies Fellowship (FLAS) (administered by the Graduate Division). Some JMP students qualify for Graduate Opportunity Program Master's Degree grants.

Each year, some JMP students choose to serve as Graduate Student Instructors in undergraduate courses or as Graduate Student Researchers. Students apply for these opportunities as they are available.  GSI-ships and GSR-ships provide remissions of certain fees and stipends [income].

The majority of JMP students fund their medical education through a variety of need-based loans: Federal Direct Loan**, Unsubsidized Federal Direct Loan**, Work Study, Perkins Loan and the Graduate Opportunity Program.  Others seek loan-forgiveness opportunities from federal and state governments and agencies for agreeing to practice in certain under-served areas. 

The AAMC [American Association of Medical Colleges] has a useful site called Financing Your Medical Education, well worth exploring.

**All federal regulations subject to change.

The deadline to submit the FREE APPLICATION FOR FEDERAL STUDENT AID (FAFSA) designating UCB Graduate/Optometry unit is March 2 .   UCB's institution code is 001312.