The Eiffel Excellence Scholarships 2022-2023 are open for online applications for next year’s batch. Eiffel Excellence Scholarships offer PhD and Master’s program to international students. The Eiffel Excellence Scholarship Program was established by the French Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs to enable French higher education institutions to attract top foreign students to enroll in their masters and PhD programs.
It gives opportunity to the future foreign decision-makers of the private and public sectors, in priority areas of study, and encourages applicants up to 25 years old from developing countries at master’s level, and applicants up to 30 years old from developing and industrialized countries at PhD level.
Two Types of Eiffel Excellence Scholarships:
- The master’s type scholarship offers 12 to 36 months of funding to enable scholarship holders to earn a master’s-level degree.
- The doctoral type scholarship supports up to 12 months of doctoral research in France as part of a joint doctoral program.
Eiffel Excellence Scholarships Benefits:
Master’s type scholarship:
- The Eiffel scholarship consists of a monthly allowance of €1,181 (a maintenance allowance of €1,031 plus a stipend of €150). In addition, the following benefits are provided:
Doctoral type scholarship:
- The Eiffel scholarship includes a monthly allowance of €1,400 until December 2021 and €1,700 as of 1st January 2022.
In addition, Master’s and Doctoral Programs provides the following direct benefits:
- International air travel: Round-trip international air travel between the awardee’s home country and France. The student awardee has one year from the end of the scholarship to take advantage of the return trip benefit.
- Train travel within France: Campus France will provide a train ticket to the awardee’s first study location and a second ticket from the last study location to the airport from which the awardee will return to his or her home country.
- Local transportation: Reimbursement of up to €50 of the cost of travel via taxi or public transportation from the airport or train station to the first study location.
- Health insurance: For awardees from outside the European Economic Area, Campus France will provide health insurance coverage until the effective date of the awardee’s enrollment in the French Social Security system.
- Supplemental health insurance: Within 2 months of arriving in France, student awardees are required to subscribe to a supplemental health insurance plan, the cost of which is reimbursed upon presentation of proof of enrollment up to a maximum amount set each year by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The maximum is unrelated to the length of enrollment. Campus France may suspend payment of living expenses and related services if the student awardee does not provide proof of enrollment in a supplemental insurance plan within 2 months of his or her arrival in France.
- Cultural activities: Under certain conditions, student awardees may also be entitled to receive assistance to meet the costs of housing outside student residences, upon presentation of proof of payment of the first month’s rent, as well as a copy of the rental contract. Said proof must be presented no later than 3 months following signature of the lease.
Eiffel Excellence Scholarships Fields of Study:
Eiffel scholarships are available in four broad fields:
- Law Education
- Economics and management
- Engineering at the master’s level and the sciences more broadly at the doctoral level (engineering as well as mathematics, physics, chemistry, the life sciences, nano- and biotechnology, earth sciences, space sciences, environmental sciences, and information and communication sciences and technologies)
- Political science
Eligibility Criteria for Eiffel Excellence Scholarships:
To receive the first installment of their scholarship, students must have begun their academic program at the host institution in France.
- Nationality: The Eiffel Program is reserved for non-French nationals. Candidates with two nationalities of which one is French are not eligible.
- Age: Candidates for the master’s component must be 25 or under at the time of the 2021 competition.
- Source of applications: Only applications submitted by French educational institutions will be accepted. These institutions commit to admitting awardees to the academic program specified in the application. Applications from any other source shall not be considered. Any candidate nominated by more than one institution shall be disqualified.
- Academic levels targeted: Eiffel Program scholarships are intended for students seeking to enroll in a master’s-level program in France (including at a school of engineering) and for doctoral candidates. Only programs recognized by the French government are eligible. The Eiffel Program cannot be used at French-run programs abroad or in connection with apprenticeship contracts or professional training contracts.
- Scholarship conflicts: Applications nominating students who, at the time of application, have already been awarded another French government scholarship will not be accepted, even if the other scholarship covered only health insurance.
- Master’s component: An application nominating a student rejected in a previous competition will not be accepted, even if the application was submitted by a different institution or in another field of study. Students who have previously received an Eiffel master’s scholarship are not eligible to receive another at the master’s level.
- Doctoral component: Institutions may nominate for a doctoral scholarship a candidate previously awarded a scholarship at the master’s level. Candidates previously awarded a doctoral scholarship are not eligible to receive another. An applications nominating a candidate rejected in a previous competition will not be accepted, even if the application was submitted by a different institution or in another field of study.
- Language proficiency: When preselecting non-French-speaking candidates, institutions shall ensure that the candidates’ language skills meet the requirements of the academic program.
Students enrolled in academic programs abroad have priority over students already in France.
Eiffel Excellence Scholarships Documents Requirement:
Documents preparation is a crucial step in applying for scholarships. Applicants are often unclear about what documents are needed for the scholarships and end up missing out on scholarship opportunities. To apply for Eiffel Excellence Scholarships, candidates must prepare for the following set of documents;
Application Procedure for Eiffel Excellence Scholarships:
Candidates should follow the following steps to apply for Eiffel Excellence Scholarships:
- Only applications submitted by French higher education institutions are accepted. So applicants should apply to the institution instead of directly applying Eiffel Excellence Scholarships.
- French higher education institutions shall preselect candidates for Eiffel scholarships from among the best foreign applicants to their academic programs.
- Institutions shall complete and submit the online applications, using the form appropriate for each level of study. They shall ensure that applications meet the criteria of the Eiffel Program. The duration of the academic program, including mandatory internships in France or abroad, must be clearly stated in the application.
- Each institution may nominate a maximum of 40 candidates per field of study for a master’s scholarship. Incomplete applications will be rejected.
Deadline to apply for Eiffel Excellence Scholarships:
The applications for Eiffel Excellence Scholarships opens in September and closes in January every year.
For more information about the Eiffel Excellence Scholarships, click here.