Tuition

Tuition & Program Investment

The Aspire Fellowship is an involved, 12-week research program built around individualized mentorship and real outcomes. Tuition reflects the depth of support each student receives, including 1-on-1 guidance from PhD mentors, structured research execution, and access to Aspire’s full resource ecosystem. The total cost of tuition is $2,597.

Aspire limits enrollment to ensure quality, attention, and accountability for every student.

What Tuition Covers

Tuition for the Aspire Fellowship includes:

  • 1-on-1 mentorship with an experienced PhD aligned to your interests

  • Personalized research guidance from idea refinement through final deliverables

  • Access to Aspire’s internal resource ecosystem, including:

    • research frameworks and templates

    • winning poster templates from real ISEF winners

    • curated project examples and databases

  • Ongoing support from Aspire advisors, including prior science fair winners

  • Competition and publication preparation, where applicable

This is not a set of prerecorded lessons or a generalized curriculum. Each student’s experience is customized based on their goals, background, and pace.

Why Aspire Is Priced This Way

Aspire is intentionally designed as a mentor-driven program, not a mass-scale course. Tuition primarily supports:

  • Sustaining a network of experienced PhD mentors and science fair winners

  • Developing and updating high-quality research resources

  • Ensuring consistent feedback, review, and support

This structure allows Aspire to deliver outcomes that are difficult to achieve through lower-touch or purely cohort-based models.

Accessibility & Scholarships

We recognize that tuition is a significant financial consideration for some families. Expanding access is an important part of Aspire’s long-term mission.

Aspire does provide need-based and merit-based scholarships based on student’s applications. Unfortunately, the scholarship pool is not infinite, and we are only able to accept select students on full rides or other forms of financial aid.

Students who receive financial aid will know upon acceptance.

If your acceptance email did not contain any mention of financial aid, you did not recieve any aid for the cohort you applied for.

Flexible Payment Options

To make the Aspire Fellowship more accessible, we offer the option to pay tuition through Afterpay (Klarna, CashApp, etc.), as well as in-house payment plans that spread the cost of tuition over 3-5 months, allowing families to split the total cost into smaller, scheduled payments over time.

Using Afterpay does not change the program experience in any way—students receive the same 1-on-1 mentorship, resources, and support regardless of payment method. This option is simply designed to help families manage tuition effectively while committing to a high-quality, intensive program.

Afterpay is available at checkout for eligible applicants and follows Afterpay’s standard approval process and payment schedule. If you have questions about payment timing or whether Afterpay is a good fit for your situation, our team is happy to help.

A Note on Commitment

Because Aspire is selective and mentor capacity is limited, enrollment represents a commitment from both the student and the Aspire team. Tuition ensures that mentors, advisors, and resources are fully dedicated to supporting each student’s success throughout the Fellowship.