How to apply
Begin by reviewing the materials for the Research Scholarship, especially the selection criteria. The profiles of past scholars can be useful too.
The application lives in our online portal, and you complete it in eight sections. You sign in with your UW NetID, so your name, student number, and email are already filled in — you don't enter those.
The eight application sections, in order
- Personal information — mostly pre-filled from your UW record
- Additional information — program questions, not evaluated
- Records release — permission to release your transcript
- Project details — title, 50-word project summary, scholarship funding quarters, weekly project hours
- Mentor information — your faculty mentor's name and email
- Project essay — three-page PDF
- Impact question — one-page PDF
- Sedlock / Smith/ Hwang scholarship consideration — one acknowledgment checkbox
When all eight sections show a checkmark, you review everything and submit.
Most of the eight application sections are quick. Two of them are not, and those are the two worth starting early.
The application components to start early
The project essay is a three-page PDF (double-spaced, 12-point font, 1-inch margins) describing your research so that someone outside your discipline can follow your thinking and someone inside it recognizes your methods. It should cover your motivation, what your work contributes to your field, your plan and methods for the award period, and the mentorship you'll receive. In-text citations count toward the three pages; one optional extra page is allowed for references, images, or figures.
The impact question is a separate one-page PDF on how your research and the scholarship shapes your education and your future plans.
Everything else
The remaining sections you can complete in less time:
- Your project title and a 50-word summary
- Which two quarters you want funding for (each provides $2,500)
- Your expected hours per week on the project
- Your faculty mentor's name and email
About your mentor
Your primary mentor must be a UW-affiliated faculty member — the person ultimately accountable for the research. Teaching assistants and instructors who are graduate students or post-docs can't be your primary faculty mentor, though you may add one as an optional secondary mentor.
Your mentor is asked for a letter of support, and your application isn't considered complete until that letter is received — so talk to them well before the deadline. Share the Mentoring overview pages with them.
By default, the mentor request email goes out after you submit. You can choose to send it early — but once you do, you can't remove that mentor from your application.
A few things that are easy to miss
- Your mentor's letter has its own deadline — two days after the application deadline — and your application is incomplete without it. Don't wait until submission day to ask.
- The transcript is required, but you don't upload anything. One section simply asks your permission to release it.
- The "additional information" section isn't evaluated. It's collected for program data. Answer it honestly and don't overthink it.
- STEM majors: the final section asks you to acknowledge you've read about the Sedlock, Smith and Hwang Scholarships — you're automatically considered for those alongside the Mary Gates Research Scholarship. It's a single checkbox.
- Funding note: the maximum any student can receive in a quarter is $2,500, even across multiple Mary Gates awards, and financial aid can affect the amount you actually receive.