U.S. Citizens and Permanent Residents
Pitt’s Doctoral Program in Communication evaluates applications holistically. We are interested in learning about not only your academic performance to date, but also your potential for contributing to research and the context for your commitment to the research you see yourself pursuing here as a student.
Apply Online
Do you have everything on the application checklist? Apply online now.
Application Checklist:
1. Application forms: The University of Pittsburgh and the Department of Communication now accept online applications only. If you need help please contact the Graduate Administrator Team.
2. Recommendation forms: Complete online in the applicant section; add the email addresses for your recommenders and they will receive an email to upload their recommendation. Your recommendation writers should be your college or university instructors who know your work well enough to evaluate it and to assess your capacity for graduate study in our department.
3. Fee: $75.00 payable via the online application. This fee is not refundable. Applications will not be processed without the paid fee.
Application Fee Waiver Information
To help reduce financial barriers to graduate education, the Kenneth P. Dietrich Graduate School of Arts and Sciences offers application fee waivers on a case-by-case basis. Submission of a request does not guarantee approval.
To be considered, please complete the Application Fee Waiver Request Form.
Fee waiver requests are reviewed during normal business hours (Monday through Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. EST), and applicants will typically receive a response within 48 hours.
Important Closure Dates
Thanksgiving Break: The fee waiver request form will be unavailable beginning the morning of November 23 and will reopen on November 30. Requests will be processed in the order received once the form reopens.
Winter Recess: The fee waiver request form will be unavailable beginning the morning of December 22 and will reopen on January 4, 2027. Requests will be processed in the order received once the form reopens.
If you plan to request an application fee waiver, please submit your request early and allow additional processing time around university holiday closures.
4. Enclose a statement of purpose explaining why you want to pursue graduate work in communication and why you are applying to our program. The statement should not exceed two single-spaced typewritten pages.
In your statement, be sure to let us know how you see yourself advancing the department’s mission and vision, in terms of your experiences both in and out of school. Specifically, you might:
- discuss your strengths in identifying research problems that interest you and operationalizing approaches to studying them;
- articulate the stakes of such problems;
- point to the scholarly and/or public audiences that you aim to address or serve in grappling with those problems;
- suggest the methodologies you now can employ or would like to learn about in order to help you in your research;
- and identify potential faculty members or other resources in our department or elsewhere at Pitt that you wish to take advantage of in order to advance your research.
5. Enclose a sample of your written work, which you believe represents your best effort. The ideal sample would be an article-length research humanities-oriented paper with proper documentation, sophisticated and nuanced argumentation, a broad base of evidence, and a deft summoning of scholarship from across humanities disciplines.
6. Collect copies of unofficial transcripts from all of the schools you have attended and upload them to the online application. Do NOT send official transcripts until you are invited to do so within our offer of admission.
- Note: As of October 2019, Pitt's Department of Communication dropped the requirement that all applicants submit scores from the Graduate Record Examination. Since those will no longer factor into admission decisions, please do not refer to them in your application application materials.