Five CEPR Students Receive First-Gen Fellowship from UofM Graduate School
September 5, 2024 - This year, the Graduate School at the University of Memphis has selected 12 students to receive the First-Generation PhD/MFA/MArch Fellowship, a financial assistance provision to graduate students who will become the first person in their immediate families to earn a doctoral degree or a Master of Fine Arts. Five of those students are from the Department of Counseling, Educational Psychology & Research (CEPR) in the College of Education (COE).
“I had to reread the email multiple times to make sure it was real,” said Sherilyn Coleman, a fifth-year doctoral student. “This news has reignited my passion and has made me even more determined to finish.”
Coleman is within CEPR’s Educational Psychology and Research (EDPR) PhD program, hoping to work in either a university faculty or private psychometrician position following graduation.
Being both a student and a mother, she took a few semesters off to focus on family. Now that her daughter is starting her freshman year at the UofM, she thought ‘Why not apply?’ for the fellowship.
“With both of us in school, I was searching for something to help alleviate the financial burden,” Coleman said. “I never truly expected to receive it.”
The Graduate School says this one-year fellowship is very competitive, campus-wide. It awards tuition scholarship plus a $6,000 stipend for full-time students and a $1,000 stipend for part-time students. The assistance is contingent upon the student maintaining a 3.00 or higher GPA.
CEPR Chair Dr. Pam Cogdal said, “We in CEPR are so excited for our students being awarded a Student Success & Innovation Award. It is a great accomplishment, and we wish each of our students the best on their continued journey through our programs.”
“Making it this far is a great achievement, but for me, it’s only meaningful if I see it through to the end,” said Coleman. “I want my children to witness my resilience and hope that it inspires them to be steadfast in pursuing their own goals.”
The other CEPR students to receive the fellowship are Danielle Newman (EDPR), Temetric Reeves (EDPR), Elisha Lawrence (EDPR) and Kumasi Turner (Counseling).
