Financial support
Nicola Sinclair, Chair of Student Funding and Finance Working Group
“We recognise that funding pressures for low-income students materially affect their experience and ability to participate while at university. This can have negative effects on retention, mental health, grades, social life, relationship with peers and employability.
The Covid-19 pandemic increased these pressures many times over, with students and their families unable to work, or facing unexpected costs due to the lockdown, quarantine or illness.
The University responded with a raft of measures including significant investment in hardship support, the development of a one-stop-shop for easy and transparent student financial support in addition to its ongoing bursary provision.”
Sustained improvements in access
Nicola Sinclair, Chair of Student Funding and Finance Working Group
“We recognise that funding pressures for low-income students materially affect their experience and ability to participate while at university. This can have negative effects on retention, mental health, grades, social life, relationship with peers and employability.
The Covid-19 pandemic increased these pressures many times over, with students and their families unable to work, or facing unexpected costs due to the lockdown, quarantine or illness.
The University responded with a raft of measures including significant investment in hardship support, the development of a one-stop-shop for easy and transparent student financial support in addition to its ongoing bursary provision.”
Access to Exeter bursary
Our Access to Exeter Bursary (ATE) is intended to support retention for those students with the lowest household incomes and indeed our evaluation shows that students in receipt of the bursary are as likely to continue as their peers.
The bursary is automatically issued to students with household incomes of less than £25,000 per year, based on information disclosed to Student Finance England and other funding bodies.
In 2020/21, 16% of our home undergraduate students – 2,849 students – received a bursary. Compared to our overall student population, recipients are significantly more likely to be Black, Asian or minority ethnic, mature, declare a disability and come from a low participation neighbourhood.
In the annual recipient survey, 43% said a significant benefit of the bursary was being able to support accommodation and living costs while others reported it helped reduce stress and anxiety and their reliance on paid work. Most of the recipients don’t receive any other financial support from the University and as well as maintenance and tuition fee loans around half of recipients supplement their income with personal savings and paid work.
67% of recipients said that the ATE bursary was ‘very important’ to their ability to financially continue their studies beyond Year 1. Overall students agree that the ATE bursary has a positive impact, most feeling significantly less anxious about their finances and allowing them to concentrate on their studies and participate in university life with their fellow students by not missing out on trips events and societies.
Bursary recipient, undergraduate home student
“The bursary allowed me to pay for clothes for my job interviews, and also the transport that I needed to get there.”
Students in 2021 received a bursary.
of students agreed the bursary benefitted them by helping with living costs.
of recipients agreed the bursary helped them continue their studies past Year 1.
Success for All hardship fund
The Success for All Fund has given an unprecedented level of support to students in financial crisis, particularly those meeting widening participation criteria.
Between September 2020 and August 2021, 2,848 applications for assistance were received which was five times the volume of applications for financial assistance in comparison to pre-pandemic. Around £2m was disbursed to some 2,000 students from 79 countries.
The Fund has helped the most vulnerable students survive financially, stay well, keep a roof over their heads and continue with their studies.
We were one of the first universities to launch a comprehensive funding scheme to support students in need due to Covid-19. Some students could no longer be supported by their families, were stranded far from home with little means of support, had caring responsibilities, were already without family support or had disabilities. Funding has been mainly spent on accommodation, food, and utilities, and also medical and quarantine expenses. We seek to signpost students who the team feel need additional support.
£2m
was disbursed to 2,000 students from 79 countries in 2020/21.
Students receive almost £2m in scholarships
Thanks to the work of Global Advancement the total amount of gifts received to fund named scholarships for some of our most exceptional students totalled in excess of £1.9m in 2020/21.
We direct these generous donations through our Exeter Scholars Award Programme which ensures we support students who meet the criteria and aims of the donation. During this academic year 52 Exeter Scholars benefited from named scholarships.