Emergency Support Fund (ESF) FAQ & GUIDELINES
The Emergency Support Fund (ESF) aims to support graduate employees through unforeseen circumstances and emergencies by providing up to $800 to cover these needs. To apply for the fund, applicants need to be current graduate student employees. Applicants will be asked to provide documentation/evidence to support their need and may be asked for additional information during the review process. Providing sufficiently detailed documentation (such as copies of receipts, medical bills, relevant email correspondence) in your application may expedite your application.
The fund is not meant to cover ongoing costs such as university tuition, university fees, and living expenses. ESF requests are intended for one-time events, and subsequent requests will only be considered in different circumstances from the first request. Priority may be given to members who have not yet made use of these funds.
FOR FALL 2026:
ESF OPENS ON MONDAY, SEP 28TH AT 9A.M. ET
The application link will be posted here at that time. ESF will cover expenses between June 1, 2026, and December 11, 2026. The fund will remain open until the end of the semester or until funds are depleted, whichever comes first.
Frequently Asked Questions
eligibility
ESF covers non-recurring expenses that make it harder for you to pay for basic living expenses. For instance, we can pay for medical, dental, and vet bills for you and dependents; travel expenses for helping family members; moving expenses for getting to secure housing; legal and immigration fees; expenses related to you or a household member losing a job; replacing broken phones and laptops; and car repair bills.
Short-term or one-time events that don’t fit into any of these categories can qualify too: we are looking for evidence that you need help and a one-time grant can help resolve the situation. If you had an unexpected event occur, and it’s preventing you from meeting your bills for rent, food, utilities, etc., we encourage you to apply!
ESF can’t cover ongoing living expenses unless there is a one-time event that makes paying them harder. For instance, while we don’t usually cover rent, if your roommate breaks the lease, we could help pay rent while you look for a new roommate. Similarly, while we don’t usually help pay tuition or UMass Boston fees, we can grant money to cover them if there is a specific reason they are unexpected or contributing to an emergency, like if you are assessed fees incorrectly or are targeted by debt collectors.
ESF is for UMass Boston Graduate Assistants (this includes Research Assistantships, Teaching Assistantships, Administrative Assistants, and Teaching Fellows). Grad students are eligible to apply if they have a grad assistantship this semester, or if they had one the previous semester and the emergency they incurred also occurred during their assistantship period.
No, only current graduate assistants or those who held an assistantship (TA, RA, AA, or TF) in the semester prior are eligible for ESF funds.
No, you are ineligible to apply for the ESF if you have graduated already and are no longer a student at UMB.
Members at all assistantship levels are eligible to apply (0.5, 0.75, or 1.0).
how applications are evaluated
2.1 Who reads my application?
Your application is read by a team of GEO Organizing Committee members and one member of the UMass Boston Administration. Currently, the GEO members are Jonathan Vega Martinez and Samiya Haque. The administration member is currently Justin Maher, the Assistant Dean of Graduate Studies.
2.2 How do you decide whether applications are funded?
First, we check if the application is eligible: whether it describes an eligible emergency and whether the applicant is a Graduate Assistant or was a Graduate Assistant the previous semester. We fund all eligible applications on a first-come, first-served basis.
If we reach the end of the semester and have more eligible applications than we can fund, we consider whether applicants have received ESF funding previously, as well as the order in which we receive applications.
2.3 What happens if I apply twice in a semester?
You can be funded twice in the same semester if you apply for two different emergency situations. If we don’t have enough money at the end of the semester to fund all applications, we will give priority to applicants who have not received ESF money that semester. However, this is rare. If you have already received ESF funding and have another emergency in the same semester, we encourage you to apply.
how the application process works
3.1 How much information should I include?
Your application should make it clear what the emergency is and what you plan to use the money for. Usually 2-4 sentences are enough. However, if applicable, you need to attach appropriate documentation that supports your claims, such as medical bills, receipts from a car repair service provider, etc.
3.2 How recent must my emergency have been?
If you are applying in the fall semester, you can apply for any emergency that happened after the end of the previous spring semester, over the summer, or during the fall semester.
If you are applying in the spring semester, you can apply for any emergency that happened after the end of the fall semester, in January, or during the spring semester.
3.3 How much money can i apply for?
Each application is eligible for up to $800. However, we encourage you to list the total amount of money you need for your emergency. This helps us make decisions about how to run ESF in the future. In addition, we may be able to fund you more than $800 if we have money left at the end of the semester.
3.4 What happens after my application is submitted?
It is reviewed by the Emergency Support Fund Committee, which is made up of GEO Organizing Committee Members and one member of UMass Boston’s administration. The committee discusses whether your application is eligible for funding and votes by simple majority on whether or not to approve it. If it is approved, we notify the Office of Graduate Studies, who release the money to you.
Sometimes, we might need more information from you about your application. For instance, we might need to confirm whether you are a Grad Assistant, or we might have a question about the nature of your emergency, or we might need to see more documentation. If that happens, we’ll email you at the email address you put on your application.
3.5 I received less money than I applied for. What happened?
UMass Boston treats ESF grants as taxable scholarships. If you applied for $800, you should expect to receive $688. In addition, toward the end of the semester, we may fund a grant partially if we do not have enough money to fund all eligible grants in full.
other questions
4.1 How much money is in the Emergency Support Fund each year?
The GEO Emergency Support Fund is allocated $50,000 per year. We split this into $30,000 for the fall semester and $20,000 for the spring semester, because emergencies that take place over the summer are eligible for funding in the fall semester.
4.2 What happens if there is money left in the ESF pool at the end of the semester?
If we reach the end of the semester and still have money left in the ESF, we will award additional money to applications that requested more than $800. For instance, if you applied for $1000 and received $800, we would award you the remaining $200. We will distribute the extra money among eligible applications on a first-come, first-served basis and contact you about next steps if you are eligible for additional funding.