FAQ – Phd studies Scholarship

Here are the answers to some of the most frequently asked questions about scholarships from the Lundberg Foundation. If you cannot find what you are looking for here, you can look for answers in the other sections of this website. Otherwise, send your question to us by e-mail. We regularly update this page with new FAQs.

About the scholarship

A full-year scholarship for 12 months of full-time postgraduate studies is currently SEK 300,000. It is paid out monthly, around the 25th of each month (SEK 25,000 per month). If you are applying for a scholarship for a period of less than 12 months and/or for part-time postgraduate studies, the amount is adjusted proportionally. If the student’s doctorate includes an obligation to teach which results in his/her course of study exceeding four years, this should be taken into account.

You can apply for a maximum of 12 months at a time.

If you are an applicant admitted as a doctoral student before July 1st, 2018 you can apply for continued support from the foundation. If you want continued support without interruption to your payments, you need to submit a new application for the following year during the open application period. The Foundation can grant a maximum of four full-year scholarships leading to a doctoral degree, provided that the student carries on his/her postgraduate studies and reports to the Foundation according to plan.

If you have not been admitted as a doctoral student before July 1st, 2018 the university must employ you when no more than three years of full-time remains to doctoral graduation. This means that scholarship only can be received in the equivalent of the first year. This also means that if the goal of the research studies is a licentiate degree, scholarship funding is not possible according to the the Higher Education Ordinance.

It is the applicant and the university that are responsible for ensuring that the rules in the Higher Education Ordinance (SFS 2017-947) are followed. The foundation assumes that applications that are submitted fulfill the requirements for scholarship funding.

No, scholarships are personal and tax-exempt, but do not entitle the holder to any social welfare benefits. It is not pensionable income, and does not include any national social insurance protection. As the receiver of a scholarship from the Foundation, you must have been accepted as a postgraduate student at your higher education institution and this must according to the Higher Education Ordinance (SFS 2017-947) entitle you to social insurance protection. Ask your higher education institution about how this works.

The scholarship is only paid for the time you are actually undertaking postgraduate studies, and therefore ceases in the case of parental leave or an extended period of illness. Your higher education institution should have taken out insurance with the Swedish Legal, Financial and Administrative Services Agency (Kammarkollegiet) which makes it possible for you to receive compensation from there. Check this with your higher education institution.

You should apply to the Foundation for a deferral via e-mail as soon as possible. Adjustments will be made in the Payment Plan and Reporting Plan as agreed. When the time is approaching to resume your doctoral project, you should contact the administration in good time to ensure that your payments start again at the right time.

The monthly scholarship amount will be the same as before when you return to your studies, even if the Foundation in the mean time has made a board decision to raise the general scholarship amount for new applicants.

You are not covered by any insurance through the Foundation. However, you are to be covered by insurance taken out by your higher education institution with the Swedish Legal, Financial and Administrative Services Agency or another insurance company, which began to cover you when you started your postgraduate studies. This might cover you for personal injury, in-service travel, illness and parental leave. You should check this with your institution and make sure that they have taken out such an insurance. If necessary, supplement with your own insurance, such as home insurance and personal accident insurance.

Who can apply?

Scholarships are only granted to postgraduate students intending to undertake licentiate or doctoral degree programs within subject areas that fall under the broad concept of the built environment, and who have been accepted as doctoral students at Swedish higher education institutions, but lack funding for their living expenses.

No. Applications of these kinds will not be processed.

Yes. However, like all other applicants, the person needs to be completing a program of postgraduate study at a Swedish higher education institution, have been assigned a supervisor and have been formally accepted as a doctoral student at the time of starting the scholarship.

Application

No. The Foundation has only one application period per year and it is only possible to apply after the Foundation has advertised the scholarships and the online application system is open for applications. The application period is from January 1 to early February. The application form can be opened and viewed as an exercise application before the start of the application period, but you will not be able to save changes to the form until after the turn of the year. For exact dates and other instructions, please see the APPLICATION page.

No. As of the 2017 scholarship year, advertised in December 2016, we are using an online application system with online forms accessed via this website. No documents should be sent to the Foundation in paper form. The Foundation now only accepts applications via this online system. Applications in any other form will not be processed.

Yes. In the online application system, the applicant chooses whether the application refers to a first-time or continuation application. This selection determines which form opens.

If you are applying for the first time or have applied before but not been granted a scholarship, you are to use the application form for a first-time application.

If you already hold a scholarship from the Lundberg Foundation for your doctoral project, you are to use the form for continuation applications. Applicants must then state the reference number, year and amount of their previous scholarships in their applications.

Yes. The supervisor is required to write and sign a letter of recommendation which is attached to the application. So that an applicant can link their supervisor to the application in the system, the supervisor also needs to create an account in the online application system. Once this link is established, the supervisor gains access to the application and can read it.

No. You can work on the application in as many sessions as you like and save it as you go before submitting it.

Yes, that’s fine. It may be useful to work on the text locally on your computer and then paste the final result into the form. Otherwise, a disruption to your Internet connection might lead to the text in the application form being lost if you have not saved your application recently. Please note that most of the fields in the form have character limits, so if your text is too long, the form can’t be submitted before adjustment. Also control that formatting in your text such as bold and italics does not disappear once you paste it into the form fields.

No. If you need to supplement your project description with formulas or graphs, you have the option of uploading these as attachments in the online application system. In that case, you should refer to the content of these attachments in your project description.

Yes. Up until the last day for applications, your application can be changed and resubmitted.

Applicants may choose to write their applications in Swedish or English.

The Foundation holds its meeting in mid-April. Notifications go out to applicants via e-mail shortly thereafter.

The first payment is made at the earliest on roughly May 25. For this to be possible, you must be formally approved as a doctoral student at your higher education institution, have submitted a confirmation letter signed by you as the scholarship holder and your supervisor, approved the Payment and Reporting Plans, and submitted your bank account details to the Foundation. All of this is done via the online application system.

Yes. After notification that you have been granted a continuation scholarship for another year, the confirmation letters must be sent and the Payment and Reporting Plans must be approved, just like for your first scholarship year. It is important that these are submitted in good time in order to avoid any break in your payments between the two scholarship years.

Reporting to the foundation

Approximately halfway through each scholarship period, you are required to submit a Progress Report. At the end of each scholarship period, you are required to submit a Final Report. The Final Report must be submitted even if the student is going to have continued support from the Foundation in the coming scholarship year.

If you were granted a scholarship for 2016, you are to submit this report in writing by post and by e-mail not later than at the end of the reporting month specified in your agreed Reporting Plan. For more information, see the page FOR SCHOLARSHIP HOLDERS.

If you have been granted a scholarship for 2017 or later years, you must submit your reports through the online application system. You can view your agreed Reporting Plan after logging in to the online application system. A short time before you are due to submit your report, a reminder will be sent to you by e-mail. For more information, see the page FOR SCHOLARSHIP HOLDERS.

Yes. Each granted scholarship (each scholarship year) should end with a final report.