Home › Becoming a Barrister › Scholarships › GDL Scholarships
Students can apply for scholarships to support them during their law conversion course. Eligible courses for an award are: Graduate Diploma in Law (GDL), LLM conversion course, and the two-year postgraduate LLB conversion course. These courses may be taken full time or part time.
In 2022, the Inner Temple will offer £200,500 in GDL scholarships.
| Award | Amount Available |
|---|---|
| Two Princess Royal Scholarships | One award of £10,000 and one award of £7,500 |
Four Major Scholarships & up to 30 Exhibition Scholarships |
Budget of £183,000. Awards will be made on merit, then for each successful applicant, financial means will be considered to decide the award amount |
The Inner Temple is the only Inn that will guarantee a GDL scholarship winner an award of at least equal value for their Bar Course.
Students who receive a GDL award from the Inn, and successfully complete their law conversion course, will automatically receive an award of the same amount for their Bar Course, without further interview. GDL award holders therefore have the certainty that a minimum level of funds will be available to them from the Inn throughout their period of study for the Bar.
Holders of GDL awards are, however, encouraged to apply for a higher award for their Bar Course year. This application should be made in the autumn prior to the start of the Bar Course. By applying for a higher Bar Course award, scholars will not jeopardise their right to the guaranteed funding.
Applicants who are unsuccessful at obtaining a GDL award are welcome reapply for a GDL award in the following application round, and are also welcome to apply for a Bar Course Scholarship Award on obtaining a Qualifying Law Degree.
Applications for 2022 are now closed.
In order to apply for a scholarship you will be required to submit an online application form, which will be linked below, when the application window is open.
The application form is broken down into 6 sections – contact information; educational details; legal and non-legal work experience; supporting information; references and equality monitoring. The ‘supporting information’ section includes professional statement/ essay style questions, which are specific to the scholarship you are applying for.
Please note that if you submit an application, you will be asked to provide details on your financial circumstances, in May 2022, via a separate form within the scholarships portal.
Candidates submit one application form and are considered for all Inner Temple GDL Awards (listed above) at the same time.
Applicants are required to arrange for two references to be included in support of a scholarship application, which can be either academic or professional references. All referees should have known the applicant for at least 6 months, and references should be as detailed as possible. Please note that family members cannot provide references.
As part of the application form, applicants will be required to provide the names and contact details for their referees. An automatic email will then be sent to the referees, asking them to upload their reference directly to us.
In the last round of GDL applications, the Inner Temple interviewed every applicant. It is the Inn's intention, numbers permitting, to continue to offer interviews to all candidates that apply for a GDL award.
In 2022, interviews for the GDL awards will be held on Friday 17 and Saturday 18 June. In mid-May, applicants will be invited to book an interview slot on one of these interview dates. We recommend holding both dates available in your diary until you receive your invitation to book your interview.
On the day of your interview, when you arrive you will be greeted by the Scholarships Team, registered and shown to the waiting area. A couple of minutes prior to the start of your interview, one of the team will collect you from the waiting area and take you through to your interview.
Interviews are conducted by a panel for 4 members of the Inn, and last approximately 20 minutes. All panel members will have been sent your application form prior to the interviews. The questions asked will be based on information from your application form and there will also be a situational test. This will be an oral test and you will not be expected to have prepared for it in advance.
After the interviews, results are usually distributed within 2 weeks, via email.
| GDL Scholarship Statistics | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Applicants |
62 | 83 | 104 | 85 |
108 | 123 |
| Interviewed applicants (minus withdrawals) | 57 | 82 | 95 | 76 |
106 | 120 |
| Total Awards | 23 |
19 | 27 | 36 |
34 | 36 |
Student Finance
If applying for the LLM conversion course, students are eligible to apply for a Masters Loan (of £11,222 if your course starts on or after 1 August 2020) from Students Finance England.
Postgraduate Loans
Post-graduate loans which cover the cost of course fees and living expenses are available from companies such as Future Finance and LendWise.
Course Providers
Many course providers have their own scholarship schemes which can provide a contribution towards the cost of undertaking the GDL or equivalent conversion course.
Differing Course Types
It is also possible to undertake the GDL part-time over 2 years at certain providers, which enables the splitting of the cost of fees. If undertaking the GDL part time, it is possible to apply for an Inner Temple scholarship in the spring before you start the course as well as the spring in the first year of your training, if your application is unsuccessful first time around.