Access to Learning Fund Help

gio6199

Hi there,

I'm a third year student who has had to generously part take with my remaining funding to help my recently unemployed (who the government is not willing to help) and disabled sister out. I have applied for a Access to Learning Fund and was wondering if i would not be entitled to it?


any thoughts would be great

jacques_chirac

You are unlikely to receive funds if you have in effect given away your money. Why does your sister have no funds, has she applied for benefits? Are your parents not able to help?

sarahlouisexo

As far as I am aware, access to learning fund money is only available to people who can prove that they are receiving the maximum amount of funding, from both loan, bursary, grant etc, and that their financial commitments (rent, food, bills, travel, course materials) exceed this substantially. You have to provide documentation to support this, and it must be detailed - so you have to take in proof of your bills and something where you've worked out that you would be short by X amount at the end of term, you are then applying for X amount from the fund.

Because you have in effect 'given away' your money (sorry, I sympathise but there is no other way to word it ) you are not eligible for an access to learning fund because you have not used the money for the purpose it was intended for. Unless you can provide exceptional personal circumstances, and I'm talking like she was about to be thrown out onto the street if you didn't pay her rent, you really won't get it.

Most access funds however do help you to get part time work and work out a budget, make savings and so on so that hopefully you won't have to use them again. You could possibly take advantage of this service at least, even if they cannot help you financially.

Get yourself down to Citizens Advice, the job centre, your sisters GP etc, etc and tell them the situation, see if they can get her on benefits, in some sort of work to help her out and get her back on her feet, and then maybe she could pay you back X sum per week?

If thats not enough for you to live in, if you have that in place you could go back to the access fund. Your only other alternatives are to take out an extra loan through your bank - if you have a student account there could possibly be deals with cheaper rates, or a credit card to get you through. Your sister could possibly pay some of the interest off?

Hope this helped and you get things sorted.