Baseline graduate stipends for fiscal year 2027 announced
LEXINGTON, Ky. (March 12, 2026) — After reviewing data and working closely with colleges and leadership across campus, the University of Kentucky’s Office of Human Resources; the Office of the Provost; Office for Student Success; Institutional Research, Analytics and Decision Support (IRADS), and other units from across campus have updated baseline graduate stipends for fiscal year 2027.
For the fourth year, the institution analyzed graduate stipends here and at benchmark institutions in order to set competitive baselines for each discipline at UK. For the coming fiscal year, all stipends were raised to a minimum of $22,000. As a result, many stipends increased by more than 10% year over year.
Like last year, UK has included the baseline stipend amounts based on the Oklahoma State University benchmarking criteria as well as the equivalent stipend amounts for departments using 20 out of 26 biweekly pay period appointments and annual appointments. Colleges and departments, which make decisions about final stipend amounts, may pay above the baseline amount.
Beginning in the fall semester of 2022, the University of Kentucky announced its commitment to further support graduate students through enhanced compensation and benefits.
Preliminary data showed that a majority of UK graduate programs already provided stipends on par with or higher than the average for their disciplines when compared to benchmark institutions.
The methodology was originally established by the former Graduate Stipend and Benefits Committee and is now reviewed annually by UK Human Resources, the Office of the Provost, Student Success, IRADS and other units to coincide with UK’s submission to the Oklahoma State University Graduate Stipend Survey.
The former committee, setting the standard for our operations moving forward, worked closely with colleges and departments, hiring departments across campus and IRADS, to analyze and implement competitive baseline stipends, using standardized data, for graduate students.
Each year, UK Human Resources and Student Success will continue working with IRADS and other units across campus to analyze data and set baseline stipends each year so that we can ensure they are at or above our benchmarks. Those baseline requirements will be provided to colleges and departments, who will make the final decisions regarding offers for their part-time graduate student positions and may choose to pay above the baseline.
Find more information about graduate student funding at gradschool.uky.edu/student-funding.
As the state’s flagship, land-grant institution, the University of Kentucky exists to advance the Commonwealth. We do that by preparing the next generation of leaders — placing students at the heart of everything we do — and transforming the lives of Kentuckians through education, research and creative work, service and health care. We pride ourselves on being a catalyst for breakthroughs and a force for healing, a place where ingenuity unfolds. It's all made possible by our people — visionaries, disruptors and pioneers — who make up 200 academic programs, a $476.5 million research and development enterprise and a world-class medical center, all on one campus.