Further education funding

Eligible Scottish resident students do not need to pay for their tuition fees on a further education course.

There are two main funds that provide assistance to full time Further Education students:

• Education Maintenance Allowance (EMA)
• Further Education Bursary Fund

More information on both of these is below.

You will need to apply for this funding through an online funding application system. If you have sent us your acceptance for a place on a course, you will be sent an email with a link to your online funding application by end of May.

To support your application, you will need to upload evidence. To find out what evidence you will need, you can download the required documents guide.

If your bursary and EMA application is successful, you will need to accept the award and the conditions of the award, laid out in the Bursary Fund and EMA conditions of award document. 

To be eligible to apply for support (tuition fees, student loan, bursary and living costs grants), you must be ordinarily resident in the UK, the Channel Islands or the Isle of Man for the three years immediately before the relevant date (the first day of the first academic year of the course). If you fall short of this period, even by one day, you will not be eligible to apply for support under the normal residence conditions.

We will not treat you as being ordinarily resident in Scotland if your main purpose in coming here has been to receive full time education, because you would otherwise be living elsewhere.