Unite Foundation Scholarship
How to apply
You need a place first: apply to the programme and wait for an offer. Scholarship applications are only considered from people who already hold one.
- Read the Unite Foundation 2026/27 guidance document fully before applying
- Apply online via the Unite Foundation application form, uploading evidence of eligibility
- Submit, then confirm submission on the next page (a 'double-submission' system) — check for email confirmation
- Your university checks elements of your eligibility and must confirm your application by its own deadline
- If unsuccessful you go on the reserve list for adjustment/clearing, or can reapply the following year
What to prepare
- Local Authority letter on headed paper confirming statutory care-leaver status (ideally stating category: Relevant/Former Relevant/Eligible/Qualifying)
- SAAS Care Experienced Students Bursary award letter, or SAAS application evidence if outcome not yet received (Scotland only)
- Letter (headed paper) or email from your student finance/award office confirming independent-student status due to irreconcilable parental estrangement
How they select
application form · evidence of circumstances
There is no interview — the decision is made on documents. On most routes there are no subject entrance exams either: the main hurdle on the way into university is proving your level of English. The exceptions are medicine, dentistry and creative courses, where tests and portfolios do appear.
Dates
If this scheme is not for you
- See the full list of schemes — it has a filter for your status and for whether student finance is available to you.
- Check whether you are entitled to student finance — if it is, a scholarship stops being the only road.
- Foundation year and Access to HE — routes for people who only have a school certificate.
- Education hub — where to start if you have not chosen a route yet.
About the institution
The Unite Foundation is a UK charity (not a university) that funds free en-suite student accommodation for up to 3 years across 20+ partner universities (e.g. UCL, Bristol, Edinburgh, KCL, Strathclyde). Important: its own published 2026/27 guidance lists only three qualifying groups — statutory care leaver, care-experienced (Scotland), or estranged from family — plus 'UK home fee status, i.e. not an international student' and being in receipt of/applying for student finance for the full course. Refugee, asylum-seeker or humanitarian-protection status is not named as its own qualifying category anywhere in this guidance document; it would only apply to someone in one of the three listed groups who also happens to have such status.
Source
Every fact on this page we opened and read on the institution's own site, rather than taking it from an aggregator. Checked on: 22 August 2026.
The scheme page on the institution's site →
Requires UK 'home fee status', age 25 or under, and care-leaver/estranged status — this EXCLUDES asylum seekers (who lack home fee status); only qualifies refugees/ILR/humanitarian protection holders who separately meet […]