Graduate Program in Demography

Department of Sociology and
the Center for Family and Demographic Research
Bowling Green State University

We offer our graduate students:

• Affiliation with an NIH-funded population research center and an energetic, growing group of demographers.
• A research home in the National Center for Family & Marriage Research – the first federally supported center to improve our understanding of how marriage and family structure affect the health and well-being of individuals, families, children and communities.
• Opportunities to obtain highly-valued job skills in data analysis and demographic techniques through applied and basic research assistantships, workshops, speaker series, and graduate seminars.

Students benefit from:

• Small graduate student seminars (usually no more than 10 students per class).
• Opportunities to work closely with faculty in an apprenticeship style.
• Highly supportive graduate student and departmental culture. The active Sociology Graduate Student Association provides opportunities for meaningful participation in departmental governance and other issues affecting student life.
• Integration of demographic training with family, criminology, and social psychology.

And, of course:

• Full funding, including tuition waivers, competitive research and teaching assistantships, and research fellowships. Financial support through research and teaching assistantships includes full tuition waivers and stipends.
• Funding is guaranteed for two years for MA students and four years for PhD students, provided satisfactory academic progress is maintained. Generous travel allowances to attend national conferences.

In addition, demography students in our program have numerous opportunities to participate in activities arranged through the CFDR. The CFDR is dedicated to training, research, and service in demography with a focus on family, children, and adolescents. A unique feature of the CFDR is its mission to integrate demographic methods, data, and perspectives with other social scientific approaches, such as social psychology and criminology. The CFDR hosts a seminar series, skill-based workshops, and an annual symposium that brings to campus top scholars with research on a targeted theme. Every year, we organize a graduate student-based population research conference.

Our graduate students in demography have the option to pursue a job in either academic or applied settings. Our students are well positioned to be placed in business, government, private research firms, and in the case of doctoral graduates, academic institutions.

Application instructions are at this link: /content/bgsu/en/academics/arts-and-sciences/sociology/graduate-program/how-to-apply.html.

If you require additional information, or have any questions about our program,
please do not hesitate to contact us (cfdr@bgsu.edu or 419-372-7279).