Overseas Research Students Awards Scheme: The Overseas Research Students Awards Scheme (ORS or ORSAS) grants awards on a competitive basis to international postgraduate research students of outstanding merit and research potential.

The number of scholarships available at Newcastle under this scheme varies (in 2004, 24 awards were given to Newcastle students).

Awards are made:

• For full-time research programmes only
• Initially for one year but may be extended up to a maximum of three years.

What does the scholarship cover?

• the difference between the tuition fee for a home (UK)
• postgraduate student, and the fee chargeable to an international postgraduate student
• and does not cover living expenses.

Scholarship Application Eligibility Criteria:

You could be eligible for the ORS scholarship if:

• you have been offered a place on any full-time research degree programme, in any field of study (except an Integrated PhD programme)
• you have been assessed as overseas for fees purposes, and are wholly or partially self-financing
• you intend to register to start your studies during the 2007-08 academic year

Existing students in their first year of study are also eligible to apply for one of these awards. Students in the first year of an Integrated PhD programme are eligible to apply for an ORS award.

Students entering the third year of their research programme will not generally be eligible to apply for an award.

The only selection criteria are outstanding merit and research potential.

Other factors such as finance, nationality, proposed field of study are not taken into account.

How to apply

If you are eligible, you will automatically be sent application details from the month of December onwards.

However, you are advised to submit your forms as soon as possible for them to be checked and references obtained.

An application form is available on request from the Financial Support Team (international-scholarships [at] ncl.ac.uk).

Contact Details: If you have any queries please contact: Student Welfare Service (Financial Support Team), Newcastle University, 6 Kensington Terrace Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 7RU United Kingdom, E-mail: international-scholarships [at] ncl.ac.uk