Law School Stipends

The Law School pays a number of institutional stipends each year, including academic fellowship stipends paid to Rubenstein Scholars and JSD and MLS degree candidates, and summer fellowship stipends paid to students pursuing summer public interest positions.

Stipend Allocation and Payment Timeline

Unless told otherwise by Law School administration, all Law School academic fellowship stipends are evenly allocated over the three quarters of the academic year (Autumn, Winter, and Spring). Summer public interest fellowship stipends are typically paid in a lump sum.

Stipends are released centrally by the University. In other words, stipend funding is requested by the Law School and subsequently processed and released by the University Payroll Office according to the University’s biweekly payroll calendar. The Law School requests stipend releases in accordance with the biweekly payroll calendar as follows:

• Academic fellowship stipends (Rubenstein, JSD, and MLS): the Friday biweekly paydate immediately prior to the start of the applicable quarter
• Summer public interest fellowship stipends: the mid-June biweekly paydate

The above requested release dates are anticipated release dates. The University Payroll Office may not be able to release stipend funding for this paydate if a student does not complete the required documentation as requested by Payroll in a timely manner. Anticipated stipend release dates for the academic year are outlined on the Law School Financial Aid calendar, available on the Financial Aid homepage.

Payment Process and Documentation

Stipend funding is paid out via Workday, the University’s human resources system. Unlike tuition scholarships and loan funding, stipend funding is not included on your quarterly tuition bill from the Bursar’s Office. Therefore, if you do not have enough tuition scholarship or loan funding to cover all of your quarterly tuition and fee charges, you will need to use a portion of your stipend funding once it is paid out for a quarter to pay your remaining tuition bill balance in my.UChicago (unless you are using other forms of financial aid, including student loans, to cover tuition and fee charges).

Students who are awarded stipend funds must complete additional documentation with the University Payroll Office prior to funds being released. This documentation usually only needs to be submitted once, prior to the first stipend release, but students may only have a few days turnaround time to finalize any outstanding items before the biweekly pay period close.

When the Law School requests a stipend, the student will receive an email notification from the Law School. Once Payroll receives the stipend request (typically a few days later), they will send email notifications to the student about any documentation required to approve the stipend. Payroll's notification emails will come from uchicago@service-now.com and will reference a “Student Stipends, Prizes, & Awards Form Request”. It is very important that the student is checking their UChicago email account for these email notifications from the UChicago Service Desk and finalizing any additional documentation in a timely manner, as outstanding documentation with Payroll can delay release of stipend funding.

Once your documentation has been processed and/or the stipend is approved by Payroll, you will receive an email from the UChicago Service Desk that your stipend ticket has been closed. When you receive this email, you should have access to Workday, if you didn't already. When you receive the "ticket closed" notification email, you must complete the following tasks in Workday:

• Verify/update your address in Workday
• Set up direct deposit in Workday

Updating Direct Deposit and Physical Address

To ensure timely disbursal of university-sourced income, the University recommends enrolling in direct deposit and updating your physical address through both Workday and your my.UChicago portal. Remember that you may not have access to Workday until your first stipend request is approved and closed by the Payroll Office.

• Types of payments issued through my.UChicago: loan refunds, student account refunds, emergency assistance from the Bursar (emergency loans/emergency grants)
• Types of payments issued through Workday: stipend income, assistantship income (research and teaching), reimbursements, awards, and other on-campus hourly roles

Updating Payment Elections

• How to Enroll in Direct Deposit in Workday
• How to Enroll in Direct Deposit in my.UChicago

Updating Physical Address

• How to Update Your Physical Address in Workday
• How to Update Your Physical Address in my.UChicago

Additional guidance and step-by-step guides on these tasks can be found on the UChicago GRADHelp website.

Additional Resources

Stipend funding from the Law School is generally classified as fellowship funding and not as pedagogical or research training. Therefore, Law School stipend funding is considered self-reported funding and federal taxes are not withheld, unless you are a non-US resident student without a tax treaty. Students may need to make estimated tax payments, particularly students who are considered US residents for tax purposes and receive a significant amount of fellowship stipend funding. The Law School cannot offer tax guidance or tax assistance so we encourage you to reach out to an accountant or other tax professional with any questions.

You can view detailed records of all payments made to you via Workday, and confirm amounts paid by calendar/tax year, by accessing your payslips in Workday. You can find more information on the stipend process and Workday steps on the UChicago GRADHelp Payment Information website and links to applicable documentation on the University’s Financial Services website. Finally, the UChicago GRADHelp Tax Information website also has helpful tax information for both US residents and international students, including guidance on stipend taxability.