Financing a Msc

Salad_2

Hello.

Are there any better ways of self financing a postgrad degree, probably 1 year, than career development loans?

Barclays are cagey about the terms and conditions of these, and you have to pay them off in their timefame with all the interest.

DJ1UK

I'm also doing a MSc 1 year course next year - and would be interested in anyones thoughts on this. I was going to get a career development loan, but might try and use 0% credit cards instead.

Anyone have any other ideas?

Thanks

DJ

r.mac_2

I have been looking at doing a masters course as well. The fees are a lot of money, plus living expenses are always high in the city.

Therefore I looked at doing it part-time over two years, enabling me to keep my current full-time job on. The fees are still relatively high, ut spread over two years, not one.

Would it at least help the amount you would need to borrow? :-/

Good Luck with the course
Rx

System

A number of universities in the UK offer European Social Fund (ESF) places on certain Masters courses. Basically, ESF is money from the EU, that universities can apply for, to fund certain MSc courses. Generally, the Masters courses that are eligible for ESF are for subjects where there is an identified skills shortage/need in the economy. This is generally things such as IT, biotechnology, Management, Sciences etc. ESF would not fund courses such as Arts type courses.

If you manage to get an ESF funded place on a Masters programme, you will generally get your fees paid for, and also a small grant (maybe £300 -600 per month). The amount will depend on the University offering the ESF places.

I'm not sure if there is a list anywhere on the web, of Universities offering ESF Masters.

From working as a consultant in the area of ESF, I do know that the two Nottingham Universities offer a lot of ESF courses. Sunderland and Teesside also offer them. Middelsex University also does.

I am sure that there are more Universities that do. The ones mentioned are just the ones that the company I used to work for, had as clients.

Hope this helps.

Dave

adi

I did a MSc a year and a few years ago and the help given to you is really bad.

I ended up funding it all out of savings having worked for a couple of years prior to the course.

Once there I scrimped and saved as much as I could to get through the year. Really hard work but worth it in the end.

Hope it all goes well for you.

System

A more general piece of advice for those looking at MSc's

Having been through the postgrad mill I'd say the best piece of advice is to only apply for funded places. I had lots of MSc offers but only a few came with cash. If you are prepared to move to another town or city you'll often find a very similar couse to the one you want being funded at another institution. You can sometimes find a list of funded places at https://www.jobs.ac.uk - this is mainly employment but sometimes you get PhD's and MSc places listed as well.

If thats not an option look for the grants directory, which is available in most (university) libraries and you may find some charitable organisations will contribute towards the costs.

Both my MSc and PhD had funding attached, I admit I was lucky and I did have to go through more interviews etc. But the pain was ultimately worth it and often if a course is funded it means its of a reasonable quality. Although that shouldn't be taken to mean that unfunded MSc's are of poor quality. In many cases it's just because they are new or because of the usual government policy of concetrating cash on the so-called elite universities.

I received my funding via EPSRC (https://www.epsrc.ac.uk) which may still publish a list of all the funded places. There are other research councils which cover subject areas such as the arts, physics and medicine, look at https://www.research-councils.ac.uk.

Hope this is of help to someone out there!

Cheers,

rod

liza99

I am wondering if there are universities in london offering European Social Fund (ESF) places on computing Masters courses. I just finished a degree in computing and I am looking around for a Master or Phd in computing....

Internet search engines did not help me at all and I do not know where to look for more information. Any suggetions would be greatly appreatiated...thank you

kellamne

I just completed the taught part of my MSc, so now got the dissertation to do :S

In September I took out a £4K loan from HSBC, and whilst I studied from Sept - May I worked 30 hours per week. Pretty extreme time management, but the loan paid the fees, and working paid my living expenses. The plan is now to get a better job whilst I finish the final sprint. I have used the overdraft of my account but Im finally just getting out of this, so hopefully by the time I start repaying the loan (end of year), I'll be settled in a job with a better income.

I think really it is worth doing it - but I can fully agree the financial support is pants, and the thought of that debt is not great. I also can say that any savings you take into the account will be heavily punished - i.e. I have none now due to the course - but I do feel a sense of acheivement

Dave_Dubya

For anyone thinking of undertaking a Masters, you ought to think about going abroad.

A friend of mine has decided to take a Masters degree at a Canadian university because it is less expensive than an MSc in the UK.

He was able to apply for a Commonwealth loan which is funding his accomodation for the two years he'll spend there and will pay for the majority of his course fees.

PaddyMcc_3

For anyone thinking of undertaking a Masters, you ought to think about going abroad.

A friend of mine has decided to take a Masters degree at a Canadian university because it is less expensive than an MSc in the UK.

He was able to apply for a Commonwealth loan which is funding his accomodation for the two years he'll spend there and will pay for the majority of his course fees.

Where did he go about applying for this and finding out the information?

Robert_Sterling_3

 I was going to get a career development loan, but might try and use 0% credit cards instead.

Doing an MSc and exploiting credit card companies generosity are two separate things.
Exploit the credit card companies regardless of whether or not you do an MSc.