MERIT / ERASMUS-MUNDUS 2006/2007 STUDENT SCHOLARSHIP CALL

MERIT / ERASMUS-MUNDUS 2006/2007 STUDENT SCHOLARSHIP CALL

The call for MERIT-Erasmus Mundus scholarships is now open. These scholarships are addressed to non-European students with outstanding academic records to start their MERIT studies in Fall 2006.

MERIT / ERASMUS-MUNDUS 2006/2007 STUDENT SCHOLARSHIP CALL

Thisis the call for applications to the Erasmus-Mundus student scholarshipsfor MERIT - the European Master of Research on Information andCommunication Technologies (see http://www.meritmaster.org ).

MERIT is a European 2-year post-graduate programme taught in English at the following institutions:

. Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC), Barcelona, Spain
. Universität Karlsruhe (UKA), Karlsruhe, Germany
. Politecnico di Torino (PdT), Torino, Italy
. Université catholique de Louvain (UCL), Louvain, Belgium

Thesescholarships are addressed for highly qualified non-European studentswilling to study the MERIT programme in two of the above institutionsbeginning September 2006.

The application deadline is 12PM (GMT)February 1st 2006 to do the initial data entry and upload of documentsin the on-line application tool. Prospective applicants are encouragedto apply early to enhance their chances to pass the pre-screeningprocess described below.

If your application is judged to havechances of being accepted, you will be invited to submit the documentsthat support your application to the admissions office by mail orcourier and upload electronic copies of these in the on-lineapplication tool. Paper submissions must be received at the MERITadmissions office by February 7th (see Calendar below).

Thiscall is subject to the general conditions of the Erasmus Mundusprogramme. In any disagreement between the contents of these pages andthose of the Erasmus Mundus programme, the latter will prevail.Prospective applicants are referred to the following pages:

General Information about the Erasmus Mundus programme:
http://europa.eu.int/comm/education/programmes/mundus/index_en.html

FAQs about Erasmus Mundus Scholarships:
http://europa.eu.int/comm/education/programmes/mundus/faq/index_en.html

We would appreciate if you can distribute this information to potential applicants.

The details of the MERIT/Erasmus-Mundus scholarship call follow.

FRAMEWORK

MERITis a research oriented Master programme within the guidelines of theBologna process whose scope is Information and CommunicationTechnologies. The MERIT partners above have specific funding from theEU Erasmus Mundus programme to set up a scholarship scheme forthird-country graduate students and scholars from the whole world. Thisscholarship scheme addresses highly qualified individuals who come toEurope to follow the MERIT Masters academic program. Students have totake two 1-year terms at two different institutions to complete the2-year MERIT Master programme.

ELIGIBILITY

Applicationsare sought from students in their final year of university programs inengineering, sciences, or an equivalent university degree involving atleast 3 years of coursework. Applications from persons holdinguniversity degrees in these disciplines will also be considered. In anycase, applicants should hold a university degree by September 1st 2006.

Applicantsshould qualify as "third-country nationals", as defined in the ErasmusMundus programme, that is nationals coming from all countries otherthan the 25 EU Member States (Germany, Austria, Belgium, Denmark,Spain, Finland, France, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, theNetherlands, Portugal, the UK, Sweden, Cyprus, Estonia, Hungary,Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia),the EEA-EFTA states (Island, Liechtenstein and Norway) and thecandidate countries for accession to the EU (Bulgaria, Croatia,Romania, and Turkey), who are not residents of any of the abovecountries, and who have not carried out their main activities (studies,work, etc.) for more than a total of 12 months over the last five yearsin any of the above countries.

SELECTION CRITERIA

Studentswill be selected on the basis of their CVs, study and academic merits,motivation, recommendations, language skills (English), internationaltest results (GRE), etc. Priority will be given to applicants whosebackground and interest matches closely with those of MERIT. To checkthis, prospective applicants are strongly encouraged to see the programdescription at:

http://www.meritmaster.org/programme

DURATION, CONDITIONS AND AMOUNT OF THE SCHOLARSHIP

Scholarshipswill be awarded for two years. In each of these years, the student willreceive a total of 16.000 Euro in 10 monthly grants per year, for agrand total of 32,000 Euro.

Note that the Erasmus Mundusscholarship also includes a yearly payment of 5,000 Euro for fees,travel expenses, relocation costs, etc. This payment will be used tocover the MERIT tuition fees for non-European students (5,000 Euro /year).

Note also that, if the scholarship is granted, nopayments will be made until the grant recipient arrives at the hostuniversity. No payment advances will be sent abroad for covering traveland moving expenses.

CALENDAR

. Deadline for online application: 12PM (GMT) February 1st 2006.
. Deadline for receiving supporting paper documents at MERIT admissions office: February 7th 2006 (if pre-screening is passed).
. Notification of Scholarships: May-June 2006.
. Start of MERIT studies: September 2006.

APPLICATION-SUBMISSION

Itis assumed that, previous to the application, the applicant has takenthe GRE general test and, possibly, the GRE subject test inmathematics. Scores from these tests should be sent to UPC directly bythe organization administering these tests (ETS). To request this youshould use the GRE institution code corresponding to UPC (7124). Seehttp://www.gre.org for details.

Application for MERIT-Erasmus Mundus has to be done in several steps.

1. First the personal data and supporting documents have to be uploaded in the MERIT Erasmus Mundus Online Application Tool (MEAT).This tool supports most current web-browsing software, and will be usedto check the applicant's eligibility, get his/her contact data, andupload relevant files such as CV, etc.
2. Once step (1) is complete,your application will go through a competitive pre-screening processthat will check for excellence in the CV and adequateness to the MERITtopics.
3. If your pass the pre-screening process, you will beinvited to complete your application and send the supporting paperdocuments.

MEAT allows applicants to enter their personal dataand the electronic versions of documents to support the application(CVs, copies of academic certificates, recommendation letters, etc.).Only PDF, JPG and GIF formats will be allowed for upload to MEAT.

INFORMATION TO BE PROVIDED

In the initial stage, MEAT will prompt the applicant to enter/upload the following information:

1. Citizenship and country of residence.
2. Periods of stay in Europe during the last 5 years (if any).
3. University degrees (held or currently studying) and universities where those degrees where obtained.
4. Gender
5. Name
6. Email
7. Birth date
8. Postal address
9. GRE exam codes and GRE exam dates (General and subject test in mathematics).
10. Scanned image of your passport showing your picture (GIF/JPG/PDF).
11. CV-Resume (GIF/JPG/PDF)
12. (Optional) Name of a MERIT faculty member who knows you and knows the most relevant items in your CV

If a candidate passes the pre-screening process, the following information will be requested:

1.Academic certificates (school certificate/diploma, Universitytranscripts, University degree certificate) relevant to MERIT topics.
2. Description of the contents of the courses taken to obtain the degree of the previous point.
3.Two recommendation letters following the format of the form availableat: http://www.meritmaster.org/meat/MERITRecommendationForm.pdf
4.Motivation letter, in which the applicant explains in English thereasons to study MERIT and how they relate to his/her career goals.
5. English degrees held / English exams passed.
6. Order of preference of the 4 MERIT institutions for the first year of studies.
7. Order of preference of the 4 MERIT institutions for the second year of studies.

Ifthe pre-screening is passed, all original documents in the list aboveshould be received in the MERIT admissions office by February 7th 2006.