Student Gateway | Careers, Employability and Skills

Careers, Employability and Skills

Students and Graduates

Contact Info

Duty Adviser hours are 10.30am-4.30pm

How to Get Funding

At Queen's: Postgraduate Office at Queen's has information on funding options for postgraduate courses and the Money Matters section of Queen's website for general information.

It is always a good idea to contact the School or Department at the institution to which you have applied to check if they provide any funding themselves or for any further ideas they may have regarding funding options.

Other Institutions: funding options, procedures and deadlines vary between institutions so look at:

Prospects website, "Funding my further study" (for study in the UK)
Postgradireland (for study in Ireland)
Student Finance (financial assistance schemes available in Ireland)
Postgraduate study opportunities with funding advertised on this website
TARGETcourses funding database
Turn To Us grants search database

We have a number of reference, online and takeaway materials available. For details see the Further Study and Funding information resources on our website and Continuing studies section of our Careers guide

You can fund your postgraduate study in various ways:

Main Funding Options
Government funding	DEL and University Research Studentships are available for PhDs etc but there is little or no funding for Masters courses, with exceptions such as the North–South Postgraduate Scholarships www.universitiesireland.ie. Information on funding at Queen’s is given above. In Britain funding is administered through a number of research councils covering specific academic areas.
Loans	The Professional and Career Development Loan system www.direct.gov.uk/pcdl has now been extended to Northern Ireland and offers more competitive fixed rate loans for further study (with some exceptions).
Institutional funding	See Queen’s Postgraduate Centre site and the Queen’s University Scholarship and Awards Handbook for details of internal funding available. If considering other universities contact the relevant university department for details of any institutional funding.
Bursaries	These may be available for certain vocational diplomas and certificates: examples include PGCEs (for teaching), nursing and social work but always check the latest course information for confirmation. Different rules often apply in regard to eligibility for bursaries for graduates domiciled in Northern Ireland so check this out thoroughly.
Educational charities and trusts	Educational trusts, foundations and charities offer a measure of funding within specific criteria, eg based on subject areas, location and other criteria. Sources of information are available for reference in the Careers Information Area of the Student Guidance Centre.
Self-funding	Many students are forced to fund their further study either partly or wholly themselves through a combination of part-time work, savings, parental support etc. You need to think through this option before making any commitments.

This information is obtained from a variety of sources, including the Association of Graduate Careers Advisory Services (AGCAS), Association of Higher Education Careers Services (AHECS), Prospects, Gradireland and relevant professional organisations and other appropriate resources, as available.

We endeavour to ensure that our online resources are current and contain relevant information. However, we cannot accept responsibility for the contents of external websites.