Double Masters - Can unique circumstances be taken into account?

Dear Karen and the rest of the Student Finance Team,

I received an offer to study the MPhil in English Studies at University of Cambridge, due to begin in October 2023.

I am not eligible to apply for Student Finance to fund my MPhil because I already have a MLitt from a Scottish University, University of St Andrews. However, I wonder if unique circumstances are ever considered in making loan decisions.

These are the ways in which my circumstances are unique:

- my tuition fees for the MLitt at St Andrews were covered NOT by a Student Finance, but in full by the Forum for Modern Languages Scholarship.
- Due to Covid and some failings from the department, I was unable to carry my MLitt to the full extent of its potential: disrupted teaching, inaccessible libraries and study spaces, and lack of academic support all contributed to damage the quality of my learning and preparation for a PhD application. This MPhil in English Studies at Cam represents a second opportunity to strengthen my profile in the specific field of English Literature and, more importantly, to bolster my chances of obtaining PhD funding.
- I come from a low-income, single parent family. My current job as a marketing executive in a hospitality context is the best paid job I've had since graduating. However, out of my monthly £2000 salary, £1000 goes to rent and bills, £500 to travel expenses and groceries, and £250 to help my mother, who is also a renter, and unable to work full time due to mental health issues. It often feels like my aspirations are being crushed by the sheer weight of trying to get by.
-During my time at Cambridge, I would first and foremost strive to keep flourishing as an academic. The incredible array of modules on offer, the challenging pace and method of study, the first-class experts on poetry, classical reception, form and style are only a few of the reasons why this course is so attractive. But on top of being an aspiring academic, I am also a writer. Before picking up my current job, I wrote articles on literature, art and politics for publications such as UnHerd, The Spectator and The Independent. While the pandemic was an awful experience for me as much as for others, it did offer my family and me respite from the usual economic fumbling, but when things picked up, so did rent and landlords' rights to haunt their tenants' dreams, and full-time freelancing was no longer a sustainable option. Last month, I pitched a first draft to a well-known literary magazine and was commissioned with the finished short story for publication in their next issue. Needless to say, I was beyond myself with pride and anticipation, which made it all the more crushing when I wasn't able to submit the final draft by the 31st of March deadline. The fault is partly mine, of my slowness and fastidiousness, but is also greatly to be attributed to the draining nature of my current job, which on some days imposes doing unpaid overtime on top of the contracted 40 hours a week. Now more than ever I crave for an opportunity to express my potential in favourable conditions. University of Cambridge is clearly a fosterer of such conditions: it has a Centre for Creative Writing, yearly hosts the Cambridge Literary Festival and partners up with BBC to deliver the National Short Story Award. My own membership college, Lucy Cavendish, has a strong tradition of supporting and celebrating creative writers, with the Lucy Cavendish Fiction Prize, awarded to aspiring women writers for their outstanding works of fiction, and the Florence Staniforth Student Fiction Prize being a testament to this. There are countless writing competitions happening every single year.
- Perhaps idealistically, I imagine that I will ultimately be able to thrive to the point that I might manage to give something back. As a teenager, I was followed for a year and a half by services for young people at risk of homelessness - a service which enabled me to do well in school and ultimately go to university. I have experienced how transformative the support of others can be, and one of the things I hope to achieve in the future is to set up charitable projects that might give vulnerable and marginalised people the opportunity to build (or rebuild) their lives the way they want them to be.

Thank you for taking the time to read this.
Sincerely,
M.