Hi all,

I'm starting a masters at the end of this month, but there's just one thing that is niggling me a bit - I have to fund it myself. Does everyone else get funding for theirs or are there a lot of people that are also paying for their masters/phd themselves? See, I told you it was just a little niggle, but I'm a bit gutted that I applied for my masters too late because I also missed all the deadlines for funding. :-(

I would have to pay for the MSc I'm about to start, but I got a funding offer in the end. I was bracing myself for paying for it though, as there were very few sources of funding.

In general masters funding is a lot more scare than PhD funding, which is kind of odd given that some fields (especially arts) require you to have an MSc to do a PhD. But I guess if that wasn't the case then the competition for PhD funding would be huge.

Remember when interpreting your poll results that just because someone is funded for their PhD as of now, doesn't mean they didn't pay for their Masters themselves - I bet a lot of us are in that position. Some people have no doubt had to fund themselves for a year or two of PhD study before getting funding too.

I would say the majority of people pay for Masters degrees - it is very rare to get funding for these. Most people do get funding for PhDs.

I was lucky enough to get my Masters fees paid and get a bursary to help with living costs. It's still going to be a tough year financially, but without the funding I could never have done it.

I paid for my MA myself with a CDL and was only given a fees studentship for the first year of my PhD so paid for living expenses myself. The last two years of my research have been paid for by funding bodies (AHRC in UK & MPG in Germany)

I start my MSc in 2 weeks as well and will be paying for part of it myself, and various members of my family are very kindly paying for most of it, without their support I wouldn't be able to do it and it gives me all the more motivation to do well. They know I want to do a PhD afterwards and are really supportive, even if they don't fully understand what I'm doing! I would definitely get funding for a PhD though, looking into different options at the moment.

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I am going to do a Masters at the same place I did my BSc. The course is self-funded.
I like it there so I will try not to mind this, except that it kind of makes me feel more pressure, but also a bit more motivated to do ok.
I am going to try to arrange to take a placement's year of work next year, somewhere that pays good.
Hopefully this will help make up for the money I will be paying.
I advise people who do self-funded Masters to put as much effort as they can in the studies, and they can worry about the money after they finish the course.
This is with the exception of those who will have to work in parallel to their studies, something that I find very difficult so if you can avoid it don't do it.

Hi Guys,
thanks to everyone who shared their experiences with funding issues. It's a relief to know that there are a lot of people who fund themselves through their Masters. I just had that horrible feeling that I was missing out on something that everyone else was getting - a silly feeling really, but you know what it's like. I suppose it's quite a good incentive too to work a bit harder if I'm paying for it myself.
Thanks again x