Maastricht University Holland-High Potential scholarship

The Maastricht University (UM) Holland-High Potential Scholarship programme offers 24 full scholarships of €29.000 (including tuition fee waiver and monthly stipend) each academic year for highly talented students from outside the European Union (EU) who have been admitted to a Master’s programme at UM.

The Scholarship programme consists of both the High Potential Scholarship (funded by the Maastricht University Scholarship Fund), and the Holland Scholarship, which is financed by the Dutch Ministry of Education, Culture and Science in conjunction with Dutch universities and universities of applied sciences. It is aimed at international students from outside the EU/EEA who wish to follow a full degree programme in the Netherlands.

Who is eligible?
Duration of the Holland-High Potential scholarship
Amount of the Holland-High Potential scholarship programme 2019/20
Application procedure
Selection procedure

UM International Services Desk

hhp.scholarship[at]maastrichtuniversity[dot]nl

Who is eligible?

All candidates must meet the following requirements:

You hold nationality in a country outside the EU/EEA and meet the requirements for obtaining an entry visa and residence permit for the Netherlands.
You have applied for admission to a full-time Master’s programme at Maastricht University for the 2019-2020 academic year. Please click here for a full list of the Master’s programmes participating in this scholarship programme.
You meet the specific admission requirements of the UM Master’s programme to which you have applied.
You have never participated in a degree-seeking higher education programme in the Netherlands. Students who have completed exchange programmes in the Netherlands are welcome to apply.
You are not older than 35 years of age on 1 September 2019.
You have obtained excellent results during your prior education programmes, as demonstrated by your latest grade transcript or certified by academic excellence. If several applicants are equally qualified, UM will give preference to applicants whose academic transcript or certified letter of academic excellence demonstrate that they are among the top 5% of the 2019-2020 scholarship programme applicants.

Application deadline

The UM Holland-High Potential Scholarship application is open up to and including 1 February 2019.

Duration of the Holland-High Potential scholarship

13 months for a one-year Master's programme
25 months for a two-year Master's programme

Amount of the Holland-High Potential scholarship programme 2019/20

Living expenses	€ 12,350 (13 months) or € 23,750 (25 months)	Paid to students by the Scholarship Office
Health & liability insurance	€ 520 (subject to change in 2019)	Arranged for and paid by the Scholarship Office
Visa application costs	€ 192 (subject to change in 2019)	Arranged for and paid by the Scholarship Office
Tuition fees	€ 13,000, € 15,000 or € 17,500 depending on the tuition of your study programme	Arranged for and paid by the Scholarship Office
Pre-Academic Training costs	€ 695	Arranged for and paid by the Scholarship Office

Application procedure

Step 1: Register for one of the participating Master’s programmes at Maastricht University. For further details on how to register for a Master’s programme at UM, please see your prospective programme’s webpage. Once you have submitted your application via Studielink, you will receive a student ID number for Maastricht University. You will need a student number in order to complete and submit the Scholarship Application Form (see Step 2 below).

Please note: only the study programmes in the list above are eligible for a UM Holland-High Potential Scholarship.
Please note: you must be conditionally approved for admission to your study programme at UM in order to be awarded a Scholarship.
Please note: if your study programme requires the payment of a handling fee as part of your programme’s admissions procedure, UM Scholarships do not cover handling fees. You are responsible for paying any handling fee your programme may require by 1 February 2019. To check whether your programme requires the payment of a handling fee, please check your programme’s webpage under the menu tab ‘Admission requirements.’

Step 2: Please fill in the application form, upload the following documents in .doc, .docx, or PDF format, and submit your application. Please note that you will only be able to submit your application once, so please ensure that all of your documents and referee contact details are up-to-date. If you have applied for multiple UM study programmes, the UM International Services Desk will ensure that your complete Scholarship application is considered for all eligible programmes for which you have a conditionally approved or approved admissions status.

Curriculum vitae. Your CV should be up-to-date, contain relevant information about your education and (job) experience, and should not be longer 2 A4 pages.
Letter of motivation. Your letter of motivation should be up-to-date and specifically tailored to this Scholarship programme. Generic letters of admission that do not directly address your motivation for UM Holland-High Potential Scholarship selection will be rejected. Your letter of motivation should be no longer than 1 A4 page. Be sure to argue why this scholarship is important to you, why you should be selected, and what your role as an ambassador of Maastricht University would be during your scholarship period, and during the upcoming years after you finish your studies at UM.
Proof of academic excellence. You may upload one of the following documents in order to prove your academic excellence: 1. Your University transcript that explicitly states your grade point average or class ranking (i.e. first class honours) for your entire study programme; or, 2. A letter signed by your institution’s Head of Department or Registrar stating that you are one of the top 20 students in the graduating year of your study programme. Please ensure that the letter contains the contact details of your Head of Department or Registrar.
The contact details of one referee. Please note that we will be in contact with your referee and ensure that you take the following steps when choosing a referee and submitting their details.
- Relationship to applicant: indicate your referee’s connection to you; is this your professor, thesis supervisor, employer? Please remember that family members may not function as referees.
- Work telephone number of your referee: Be sure to include the applicable country calling code.
- Work or institutional email address of your referee. Letters referencing only a personal email address will be rejected.

Please note that you will only be able to submit your application once, so please ensure that all of your documents and referee contact details are up-to-date.

Step 3: Contact the referee you provided in your application form and ask them to submit their reference letter by email hhp.scholarship[at]maastrichtuniversity[dot]nl by 1 February 2019.
We have prepared Scholarship reference letter guidelines; please print these out or forward them to your referee, as they will help your referee to write a good reference letter on your behalf. Please note that referees must be (former) professors, lecturers, or employers, and not family members. Recommendation letters should be dated and written no earlier than February 2018. Please also note that it is your responsibility to liaise with your referee and ensure that they submit their letters by 1 February 2019 (Central European Time). Applications for which we have not received reference letters are unfortunately incomplete, so please communicate on time with your referee about this important step in the Scholarship application process.

Selection procedure

Step 1: The UM International Services Desk checks that all applications are complete.
Step 2: The International Services Desk sends all complete applications to each UM Faculty by mid-February 2019.
Step 3: Each Faculty selects and ranks their top 5% of Scholarship applicants and sends these to the UM Scholarship Taskforce for a final check by the middle of March.
Step 4: The UM Scholarship Taskforce confirms the Faculty selections by the end of March.
Step 5: The International Services Desk will inform all candidates of their application status in April. Your status will be selected, waitlisted or rejected by the beginning of May 2019 at the latest. Waitlisted application statuses will be finalised as selected or rejected by May 2019. Scholarship awardees will receive more information about the UM Pre-Academic Training programme and arrival in Maastricht upon receiving their award letters. The UM Pre-Academic Training is a three-week mandatory component of the UM Holland-High Potential Scholarship programme. The Pre-Academic Training takes place in August 2019.