Contextual Offer and Bursaries

What is a contextual offer?
Our contextual offer is a grade reduction of up to three grades below the standard entry requirements.
Details of our standard and contextual offer entry requirements are available on course pages.

Could I get a contextual offer?
If you are a UK student applying for an undergraduate degree (excluding foundation years and foundation degrees), you may be eligible for a contextual offer if one of the following statements applies to you.

• • You have lived in local authority care

  • Your residential status is ‘refugee’ or ‘humanitarian protection’

  • You have participated in the Brookes Engage or Discover Brookes sustained outreach programmes

In addition, you may be eligible if you meet a combination of the following criteria:

You attend a school where average performance is below average at GCSE or in the bottom 40% nationally at A level (or equivalent)

and

You live in an area of low participation in higher education

or

You live in an area of higher socio-economic disadvantage

How do I apply?
There’s no separate application form, so apply in the usual way through UCAS and if you meet any of the criteria we’ll consider you for a contextual offer.
Remember to indicate your residential status or if you have lived in care, if relevant.

What will happen next?
You can find out it you are eligible for other support including bursaries and scholarships and our tailored support packages for specific groups of students.
If we make you an offer, we’ll invite you to an applicant day with all other offer holders. Here you’ll meet the academics and current students from your course, and have the opportunity to find out more about the full range of experiences Oxford Brookes has to offer. We offer a travel bursary for applicant day events.
If you accept our offer, we’ll contact you nearer the summer to let you know about a range of opportunities to find out more about Oxford Brookes, and to support your transition into university life.

You may be worried about the cost of coming to university, but there is financial support available. A government loan to cover your tuition fees is available to all UK students and you may also be eligible for a bursary to help towards your living costs.

The Oxford Brookes Bursaries Scheme is available to qualifying students for each year of their studies and does not need to be paid back. It is available to all eligible UK full-time on-campus undergraduate degree students on £9,250 undergraduate courses whose commencing year of study is 2023/24, as follows:

• If your household income is under £25,000 you will receive an annual Oxford Brookes Bursary of £750.

• If your income is under £25,000 and you are 21 or over on 1 September 2022, you will be eligible for the Mature Bursary of £1,500

• If your income is under £25,000 and you are living in a recognized postcode area you will be eligible for the Enhanced Bursary of £3,000.

You are only eligible for one of the above bursaries.

Eligibility for enhanced bursary

You are eligible for the Enhanced bursary if your permanent home postcode indicates that you live in an area of low participation in higher education or a low socioeconomic area. This must be your home address when you enrol at University and we must hold this address on our Student Record System. You can check if you would be eligible by using the following look-up sites:

(a) Visit the Office for Students site to see if you live in an area of low participation. Check the first column titled ‘Polar 4 young participation quintile’. If the number listed in the row beneath is a 1 or a 2, you are eligible for an enhanced bursary.

(b) Visit here to see if you live in a low socioeconomic area. Check the column titled ‘Index of Multiple Deprivation Decile’. If the number listed against your postcode is 1 to 4, you are eligible for an enhanced bursary.

There are lots of bursaries available at Brookes for students from a range of situations, for example estranged students and care leavers, and covering things like mandatory field trips.

Read more here: https://www.brookes.ac.uk/studying-at-brookes/finance/undergraduate-finance---uk-students/financial-support/financial-support-home-2023-24/