The Sam and John Dawson Scholarship 2025 entry

The Sam and John Dawson Scholarship will provide up to £60,000 per student (£15,000 per year for 3 years, plus a Professional Training Year (PTY) if taken for a care-experienced student at the University of Surrey.

About

The Sam and John Dawson Scholarship will support an undergraduate student studying a STEM course during their degree programme at the University of Surrey.

The scholarship will provide £15,000 a year for three years of academic study, plus £15,000 for a Professional Training placement (if taken). The Sam and John Dawson Scholarship will be awarded to two successful applicants.

Eligibility criteria

To be eligible to apply, the applicant must be a first-year undergraduate Home/UK student studying an undergraduate STEM course at Surrey who is from a care-experienced background.

Care experienced is defined as students who “have spent time in local authority care, in a residential children’s home, have been looked after at home by a supervision order or have lived with relatives under kinship care.”

Criteria for care experienced is as follows:

Living with foster carers under local authority care
In residential care (e.g. a children’s home)
Looked after at home under a supervision order
Or in kinship care with relatives or friends, either officially (e.g. a special guardianship order) or informally without local authority support.

Eligible courses are:

How to apply

To apply for this scholarship students entering the first year of their undergraduate degree in a STEM subject at the University of Surrey should complete all sections of the online application form.

Please note that you cannot receive this scholarship in addition to the other University bursaries.

Students will be advised of their application outcome during the first semester.

Please note that application to the Sam and John Dawson scholarship is competitive and not all applications will be successful.