(Subject) 'With a year abroad' - How do loans work, etc?

Hey.

I'm interested in studying Politics and a lot of universities obviously offer a year abroad. How does the 'Year abroad' thing work in terms of your fees? Do you need to provide a lot of the fees from your own background/work or does your maintenance and other loans from the UK cover the accomodation and what not in the year abroad year?

Also, when you apply for the course 'year abroad', is a completely different course or will you be competiting with the people who aren't having a year abroad? Does it have any affect on your application? Will the university be more inclined to accept/reject you?

Thanks,

Reply 1

lauramercier

I'm on my year abroad now. I pay £1350 to my home uni and nothing to my foreign university.
My maintenance loan is way more than my accommodation abroad, I'm only paying £1000 for the whole year so my loan is fine.

Reply 2

meaow1990

Where are you studying, laura? Like, what country? £1000 for a year's accommodation is .. wow! (jealous)

Reply 3

xmarilynx

Depending on your university's policy, you either pay no fees at all or half the normal amount to your home university. If you study in Europe as part of the Erasmus programme you don't need to pay any fees at all to your exchange university. You receive your maintenance grant/loan as normal as well as an Erasmus grant (about €300/month) and I've also heard the UK government gives you money towards flights. So financially you should be better off than usual but it really does depend on where you're thinking of going and what you're thinking of doing (studying, working as a language assistant in a school, internship etc).