Grants & Funding

Vocational Training Opportunities Scheme (VTOS )

Please see VTOS page.

BTEA (Back to Education Allowance)

Please see BTEA page.

BCFE Department of Guidance and Counselling Notes on Grant Applications 2012

To qualify for a maintenance grant, you must fulfill the conditions of the scheme as regards:

Means
Nationality and immigration status
Residence

Students attending full-time approved courses in BCFE for the academic session 20011/2012 are eligible to apply for a maintenance grant. At present BCFE Level 8 Degree courses are not on the DES approved list of courses. This grant does not cover the cost of registration or examination fees. Students doing Post-Leaving Certificate (PLC) courses do not get fee grants. Students who are eligible for the maintenance grant will be exempt from the PLC participant contribution (Euro 200 government levy).

The maintenance grant is paid directly into the students' bank account each month and is available to fully registered PLC students who are progressing from one level to the next. There are detailed conditions about the level of the course you are attending; whether you have attended a course at the same level already; and whether the course represents progression from your previous studies. In general, you will not get a grant for repeating a year or attending a course at a level that does not represent progression from previous studies. However, ‘second chance students’ may be eligible for a grant. Also since 2009/10 students participating in BTEA and VTOS are no longer eligible to qualify for receipt of PLC Grants.

How to apply

From 2012-2013 on students apply for the PLC Maintenance Grant to City of Dublin Vocational Educational Committee (CDVEC), Town Hall, Ballsbridge, Dublin 4. It is intended that all new grant applications will be made online from 2012-2013.

Forms are available on studentfinance.ie
Apply for the grant BEFORE 31 August. Late applications are accepted but processing will be delayed.
Make sure you fill in the grant application form correctly and without leaving empty spaces. If you have any questions, call the local authority office in charge of grant applications in your area.
Delays can be caused if all relevant documentation is not attached.
Bear in mind that there can be significant delays in processing grants. Therefore budget carefully before grant money is paid.
Please ensure that you have visited www.studentfinance.ie to familiarise yourself with all relevant information about student grants and to read the Guidance Notes for completing an application form, before you apply on-line.

Step 1: Register on studentfinance.ie (You will need your PPS Number)
Step 2: Activate your account. The system will send you an email with activation link. Follow the instructions in the email.
Step 3: Log into system and complete your application. Note: you can save your progress and return to the application at anytime.
Step 4: When application form completed, submit your application. The system will send you an email with a checklist of required documentation and a declaration form.
Step 5: Check your email. Gather your required documentation and post them, the checklist and the signed declaration form to your awarding authority. You’re application will be queued for assessment when the Awarding Authority receives this information.
Step 6: Return the course acceptance form / FA2

Renewals of existing grants will be handled by the authority that issued them initially.

Supporting Documentation

1. Documents detailing income are required. These generally relate to the previous year: e.g. if you are applying for a student grant for 2012-13, you will be asked for a P60/P21 for the year 2011.
A quick and easy way to deal with your tax affairs is by using PAYE self-service. You can view your own tax record, request tax refunds, request a review of your tax liability, claim a wide range of tax credits or allocate tax credits between you, your family/your spouse. You can also request a copy of your P21.
2. An original copy of your long birth cert is required.
3. FA2- Course Acceptance Form
When you have accepted a place on an approved FULL-TIME Post-Leaving Certificate (PLC) course in BCFE for 2012-13 and have applied for a student grant for 2012-13 you will need to complete an FA2 form. The form is available in English or Irish. Please download from www.studentfinance.ie and print the form for manual completion. Post to CDVEC.
4. The Guidance Notes for the Student Grant have full details on the relevant documentary evidence required to be submitted with your application. The responsibility is with the applicant to submit the correct documentary evidence with a completed online or hard-copy application.

Means

The PLC Maintenance Grant is a means tested grant. Your income must be below a certain level before the grant is awarded. This involves an assessment of the earnings in the family (parents and candidate). Students over 23 years of age, who are living outside the family home will be assessed on their income and that of their spouse (if applicable).

If you were ordinarily resident with your parents from October 1 of the year before the year of entry to the course, you are considered dependent on your parents and your income (if any) is assessed together with your parents' income(s). An allowance is made for the students’ earnings outside of term-time – up to €3,809 currently.

Independent mature candidates are candidates aged over 23 who live separately from their parents from 1 October of the year before the year of entry to the course. If you are an independent student, you are assessed on your own income (and that of your spouse, civil partner or cohabitant, if applicable).

The means test for a student grant in 2012-2013 is based on your family's income for the previous full tax year (2011). However, if you or your family have had a change of circumstances (which is likely to be permanent) since 31 December 2011, your changed circumstances may be taken into account.

Some social welfare payments are excluded from 'reckonable income' for the purposes of student grants - see more details on reckonable income on studentfinance.ie.

Budget 2012: The value of certain capital assets will be taken into account in the means test for student grants from 2013.

Income limits for maintenance grant

The family income limits for eligibility for a maintenance grant in 2011-2012 are set out below. These limits also qualify you in respect of the fee grant (if you are otherwise eligible).

Number of dependent children	Full maintenance	Part maintenance (75%)	Part maintenance (50%)	Part maintenance (25%)
Fewer than 4	€41,110	€42,235	€44,720	€47,205
4 to 7	€45,165	€46,415	€49,145	€51,880
8 or more	€49,045	€50,400	€53,360	€56,320

The Budget has reduced the income thresholds for entitlement to student grants (listed above) by 3% for the session 2013/14. This table will be updated as soon as the new table becomes available.

Maintenance grant rates for 2012

The levels of maintenance grant applicable for 2012-13 from January 2013 are as follows:

(All figures are in Euros)

Type	Non-adjacent rate	Adjacent rate
Special rate	€5,915	€2,375
Full Maintenance	€3,025	€1,215
Part maintenance (75%)	€2,270	€940
Part maintenance (50%)	€1,515	€605
Part maintenance (25%)	€755	€315

According to Budget 2012 existing rates of grant support as outlined above will be maintained for those qualifying in 2013. Any changes announced in Budget 2013 will be effective from January 2014.

Adjacent and non-adjacent rates

For students who live 45 kilometres or less from the college being attended, the adjacent rate of maintenance grant is payable. This rate applies to all students living within this distance, including all mature students, both dependent and independent. The non-adjacent rate applies to everyone else.

Further info available at www.citizensinformation.ie

Nationality and immigration status

Only EU nationals who have resided in the relevant local authority since the 1st of October of the year previous to starting the course may apply.

In order to get a student grant you must:

Be a national of an EU member state or an EEA member state or Switzerland
or
Be a family member of one of the above, with permission to remain in the State as a family member of such person under the European Communities (Free Movement of Persons) Regulations 2006 and 2008 and EU Treaty rights provisions
or
Have refugee status
or
Have been granted humanitarian leave to remain in the State (foreign nationals granted leave to remain under the Irish Born Child scheme - IBC/05 are not eligible)
or
Be eligible for subsidiary protection or have been granted leave to remain under the European Communities (Eligibility for Protection) Regulations 2006
or
Have permission to remain following a determination not to make a deportation order
or
Have permission to remain in the State by virtue of marriage to, or civil partnership with, an Irish national living here or be the dependent child of a person with such permission

Residence

Since the academic year 2010-2011, you must have been legally resident in the State for 3 of the previous 5 years to qualify for a maintenance grant. However, if you are studying elsewhere in the EU for a recognised qualification, and you were resident in the State for 3 of the 5 years before starting that course, you satisfy this requirement. Find more details of this requirement on studentfinance.ie.

Maintenance grant

A maintenance grant is a contribution towards the living costs of a student and is payable at

(a) the standard rate, at either a full (100%) or part (75%, 50% or 25%) , depending on the level of reckonable income or
(b) the special rate which is payable depending on the level of reckonable income and on condition that you are in receipt of an eligible payment as at the 31 December 2010

The maintenance grant is paid at either the adjacent or non-adjacent rate, depending on the distance between a student’s normal residence and the institution where the approved course takes place. The adjacent rate is payable if the student’s normal residence is 45km or less from the approved institution they are attending. The non-adjacent rate is payable in all other cases.

If you fulfil all the criteria for a maintenance grant except for the residence condition in the State, you may still qualify for a fee grant as a ‘tuition student’.

A tuition student is someone who fulfils all the conditions for a student grant except for residence in the State, but who has been resident in an EEA state or Switzerland for 3 of the last 5 years .The members of the EEA (the European Economic Area) are the 27 members of the EU, along with Iceland, Norway and Liechtenstein.

Your parents or guardians, or you yourself if you are an independent mature candidate (see below) must have been ordinarily resident in the administrative area of the local authority from 1 October prior to applying for the grant.