Loans, Grants & Fees

 

If you are going to study a postgraduate course you will not receive any funding from the government. It is a good idea to have your funding in place before embarking on a course. You may have to start the process far in advance of the course commencing.  There are limited funding options available to you and you might have to make up funds from a few different sources.

 

Some options you could consider are:

• Sponsorship from your school
• Funding from charitable trusts and educational bodies
Government sponsorship
British Council/Foreign and Commonwealth sponsorship
• Research councils
• Sponsorship from employers
• A bank loan
• Personal savings

 

Sponsorship search.

The University has a general database of 

internally-funded postgraduate scholarships here: http://scholarships.leeds.ac.uk. You can search for a scholarship that may fit your criteria – these are competitive so the earlier you apply the better. You can also search for funding on www.findaphd.com.

 

Sponsorship from your school.

Not all schools at the University of Leeds add their scholarships to the database listed above – so it is worth asking your school to see if there are scholarships you have not already found out about.
 

Funding from educational bodies and charitable trusts

There are many of these offering small amounts of funding to students. It is a good idea to try to access some funds from these whether or not you have a loan. A bit of extra help is always nice and you will not generally have to pay the money back. However you are unlikely to find complete funding via this route. Look at our page about Funding from educational bodies and charitable trusts.
 

Research Councils
The research councils

provide funding for PhD study and for some Masters level courses. Visit the Research Councils UK website at http://www.rcuk.ac.uk, where you can find links on the right to the various Research Councils

 

Sponsorship from employers

Some employers are willing to pay for Masters degrees and you may receive sponsorship for doing a doctorate. This will have to be pre-arranged before you start the course.

 

Loans

Shop around the various banks asking for rates and quotes for graduate and professional studies loans and see who will offer you the best deal. Beware of interest rates which are not fixed and think about when and how you are going to pay them back. One loan designed specifically for students is:
 

Career development loans

• These are run in partnership by Barclays, Co-op, the Royal Bank of Scotland and the Learning and Skills council
• The Learning and Skills Council pay off the interest whilst you study.
• You pay back the loan once you graduate at a fixed level of interest.

Visit www.direct.gov.uk for information about Career development loans.
 

 

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