Hi guys! My name is John Villa.
I’m a postgraduate student in the Art History department at The University of Nottingham.
I was asked to talk to you today about postgraduate funding, which is interesting because
I am not really qualified to give ‘financial advice’ to anyone.
I’m an Art Historian, not really good with numbers.
But I do have a lot of experience in looking for funding for school.
Hopefully this will help to point you in the right direction on where to begin looking
no matter what situation you’re in, what course you’re doing, or where you’re coming from.
If you’re doing a postgraduate degree at The University of Nottingham,
the best place to start by far is the postgraduate funding website.
It’s super organized, it takes you right from the beginning into two sections,
whether you’re doing a postgraduate taught course like an MA, or a postgraduate research course.
This page has a really great broken-down guide into where to go about looking for funding
for your research opportunities, whether that’s by your research subject area or international student research.
If you’re doing a taught MA course like I am, there’s a whole bunch of stuff for you.
Funding for postgraduate taught courses tends to be a little more limited than what
you may be used to in your undergrad, but it is there.
Right away you’ll see some information for if you are a UK student including links to
your academic school for course-based funding, loans from the British government for your Masters,
Professional Career Development loans, links to the Graduate School.
There's a really great step-by-step guide for funding which covers all possible areas.
So if you really have no idea where to look or what category applies to you
then I would suggest going to this page.
It is useful to check your subject area because some taught course subjects
have their own funding opportunities, so find out if there’s any course-specific funding for you.
And then there is the page for international MA funding, which applies to me and a lot of other students.
It’s hard enough sometimes finding funding to go to school in your own country,
but if you want to go abroad like I did, that kind of adds a whole other layer
of ambiguity and confusion.
There is a page for all of the Masters scholarships for the coming year.
These do differ by availability of the country that you’re coming from, but that’s all broken-down for you.
There is a page for external sources of funding by region,
so this will link you to your country’s own scholarship programs
and your government’s funding program.
If you’re from the US, there is a tab on the left hand side for US Federal Aid
because this can be a very tricky topic. This breaks down how to apply
for your federal loans and it’s just really super helpful
because if you go to the FAFSA website on your own, it can be a little confusing.
There is also a link to the scholarship coordinator for the US federal loans who is super helpful
and very nice and answered a lot of my questions last year.
Personally, I did end up getting federal loans from the US government to pay for my school.
Yes you will have to pay it back eventually, but it’s a really good secure way to get your funding.
There’s also a really useful page on general living costs which will help you figure out
how much you’ll need living in this country versus your own.
So, in summary, if you want to do a postgraduate course at The University of Nottingham
and you’re overwhelmed and worried that you’re not going to be able to find
enough funding to pay for it, stop worrying! Just go to this website.
Look at your options, because there are options. There is funding out there.
It’s just not as readily put in your face as when you’re doing your undergrad.
You just have to know where to look for it and actually go out and get it.
There will be a link to this website in the description box so please check it out!
I hope this was helpful. Good luck with your funding search.
And I will see you guys again very soon!