More

DMU Support Fund - postgraduate student information

Am I eligible to apply?

  • You must be enrolled on your course
  • You must be a 'Home' student (and be assessed as such by your funding provider)
  • You must have an agreed payment plan for your tuition fees in place with DMU and be up-to-date with your payments. If you have a tuition fee debt (or other debt) to the University you will not be eligible to apply
  • You must have applied for the maximum SFE Postgraduate Loan/ SFE Postgraduate Doctoral Loan/ or NHS Social Work Bursary
  • If you are not eligible for this funding (e.g. your course doesn't qualify), you can still apply to the DMU Support Fund, as long as you can evidence you have sufficient funds to cover the total of your Tuition Fees 
  • We would expect postgraduate students to have considered how they will cover their fees and living costs prior to enrolment. This could be via a combination of loans, scholarships, wages, savings, family contributions, income-related benefits
  • Students studying at a partnership college/ institution are not eligible to apply. Please contact your college/ institution for advice and support.

What does this Fund help with? 

  • Care experienced: for students who can show they have been in care at some point in their lives (continuing students only)
  • Disability/ medical condition (not a learning difference) that prevents you from working part time
  • DSA Laptop shortfall
  • Future rent deposit (only for students on a 2-year course, going from Year 1 into Year 2)
  • High rent and energy bills/ high mortgage and energy bills
  • High travel costs (from term-time address to DMU campus)
  • Repeat prescription costs
  • Registered childcare (Full-time students only)
  • Students with children (who live with them and are under 18 years old).

How do I apply?

If you have checked you are eligible to apply, enrolled students will need to set up an account with Blackbullion first – you can register for free with your DMU email address. For more information, please visit our Be Money Smart web page.

Please ensure that you take the time to familiarise yourself with our video guides below on what we require, as missing evidence is the main reason why assessments are delayed. Help us to help you, by supplying all the required evidence from the start, when you submit your application.

You will need to upload your evidence documents within the online application form. Please make sure that you take the time to input all the correct information. You don't need to complete it all in one go, you can go back to your application another day before you submit it. But, once you have submitted your application, you will not be able to submit additional evidence until we have checked your evidence. You will also not be able to submit another application until we have completed your assessment.

As part of the application process, you will be required to complete three learning pathways, set by us, within Blackbullion’s learning platform. If you applied last academic year, you will have done two of the pathways before. We will allocate the pathways to you (after you have submitted your application) within your Blackbullion account, so please ensure you check your DMU emails and your Blackbullion account regularly.

  1. What happens after I apply?

    As long as you have provided all the required evidence and only AFTER you have completed the allocated pathways, we will aim to assess your application within four working weeks. If you are eligible for an award, you may need to allow a bit longer to receive the payment. Dates when DMU is closed (e.g. Christmas and Easter) do not form part of the turnaround time.

    If an assessor contacts you to ask for clarification or for further evidence, it may take longer for your application to be assessed. We will aim to continue with the assessment as soon as we can after receiving the additional information.

    You can check the status on your application page, within your Blackbullion account. Please avoid contacting us to check on the progress of your application until the four-working weeks have passed, unless you have a change of circumstances. The time spent investigating these enquiries stops the assessors from working on assessments.

  2. How can I contact you?

    If you need advice on completing your application form, obtaining your supporting evidence, or on any issues relating to your student finance, please contact DMU Money Advice:

    Tel: 0116 257 7595 (select option 3, then option 3 again)

    Email: sfw@dmu.ac.uk

  3. How do I query my assessment decision?

    If you are not satisfied with your assessment decision, you can book a 15-minute Quick Query appointment to review the outcome.

    If there is additional information that comes to light, or your circumstances have changed and you are able to provide evidence to support this, the administrator will determine whether to re-assess your application. If there is no additional evidence, the original decision will remain the same.

Evidence

If you have checked that you are eligible to apply, please take the time to familiarise yourself with what evidence you will be required to supply, depending on your circumstances.

You will need to have all of your evidence, in an electronic format, ready to upload. You must submit the requested evidence, if you don’t, we can’t assess you, so please check all of the guidance videos that apply to your circumstances below. 

Blackbullion provides Open Banking as an alternative way to submit your bank statement evidence. If you provide your consent, the technology allows us to connect to your bank statements, which means you don’t have to download PDFs of 3 months statements and then upload them to your application. This should make the process of supplying bank statement evidence much easier. Rest assured we cannot edit or make any changes to your information, accounts, data and details. More information on Open Banking is provided by Blackbullion when you are asked how you will be submitting your bank statement evidence.

For your other evidence, you can use a free app called Adobe Scan, or take photos, or download PDFs, but please make sure that your evidence is clear, easy to read and you don’t chop off any important details.

You must supply the following:

Bank statements

Postgraduate funding

Depending on your circumstances, please upload all the evidence that is applicable to you and what you state on your application form:

Childcare costs

Children - if you don't use childcare

Disability or medical condition: unable to work part-time

DSA laptop shortfall

Future rent deposit

Partner's income - if you live with your partner

Prescription costs

High rent or mortgage costs

High travel costs

If you have already applied in 2024/25 and you are submitting another application:

Re-applying - check to see what additional evidence we need