New UQ scholarships snapped up by postgraduates
Postgraduate students will be able to travel to laboratories and libraries across the world thanks to one of three new scholarship schemes at the University of Queensland.
The schemes, introduced in August this year, build on the institution's recent announcement as 1998 University of the Year and have already made academic life easier for 57 postgraduate students.
The new schemes, valued at $454,000, are part of $4.5 million the University expects to allocate for new and continuing scholarships in 1999.
Deputy Director of the University's Graduate School and Dean of Postgraduate Students Associate Professor Alan Lawson said 38 students had been awarded Graduate School Research Travel Awards (GSRTA) while a further nine had taken advantage of the University of the Year Early Start Scholarships (UYESS).
Another 10 students had been awarded places under the Early Conditional Offer (ECO) scheme, Dr Lawson said.
The Research Travel Awards provide $5000 for students wishing to complete short to medium-term research trips overseas and $2500 for Australia/New Zealand trips. Of the successful applicants, 26 will receive funding for international travel to places including America, China and Nigeria, 10 for Australia/New Zealand trips and two will get supplementary awards of $1000 each.
"Awarding these scholarships gave us particular pleasure because of the great need among postgraduate students to travel to resources, equipment and archives in other parts of Australia or elsewhere in the world in order to do their research more effectively," Dr Lawson said.
Dr Lawson said the UYESS scheme had allowed students who finished their first-class honours degrees mid-year to start their PhDs immediately rather than wait until the new academic year started in January.
Successful applicants receive a stipend from the University which is equivalent to that of the Australian Postgraduate Award (APA). This year, the APA was valued at $15,888 per annum.
Successful students for this scheme were ranked very highly by prospective departments on their research potential and the compatibility of their proposed research topic with UQ research strengths.
"Students graduate mid-year for a variety of reasons. They may have completed dual degrees, returned from overseas study or had to interrupt their undergraduate years due to financial or family reasons," Dr Lawson said.
The ECO scheme aims to snap up outstanding potential first-class honours students for PhD studies at the University by making early conditional offers of scholarship.
University departments nominated students who applied for APAs/University of Queensland Postgraduate Research Scholarships during the normal application period in September-October who were obviously outstanding and who were expecting offers from several universities. Ten early offers were made to outstanding applicants.
"It's appropriate that the University expands its range of schemes for postgraduates given that its University of the Year accolade from the Good Universities Guides is based on the criterion of outstanding outcomes for graduates," Dr Lawson said.
"The University of Queensland has been nationally recognised as the university with the best track record in the proportion of graduates who seek and find full-time work or go on to further study.
"The new schemes are a fitting way to mark the award by making a tangible difference in the lives of postgraduate students."
He said the University was also increasing the value of the UQPRS to match the value of APAs and would continue to fund HECS exemptions for all research higher degree students.
Media contact: Dr Lawson (telephone 07 3365 3477)
