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New PhD students undertaking full-time research in the area of Intellectual Property (IP) can apply for a Herchel Smith Scholarship to start in the 2024-25 academic year. The award covers three years of study while in full time enrolment, subject to satisfactory annual progress reports.
The award will cover all tuition fees whether at the Home rate or the International rate. It is therefore open to both UK and International applicants. In addition, an award of around £20,500 per year (reviewed annually) will be paid to the recipient on a regular basis throughout the academic year starting from September 2024.
Successful recipients of this award will undertake research support work and any related tasks as required, of up to 6 hours per week for the duration of their studies, for the Queen Mary Intellectual Property law Research Institute (QMIPRI).
The Herchel Smith PhD Scholarship Programme recognises and supports exceptional full-time students who show the potential to make an outstanding contribution to the area of intellectual property law. This programme supports PhD students in intellectual property law and those working at the intersection of intellectual property law and other areas of sciences and humanities.
The award is for new applicants who will enrol at the start of the coming academic year, in September 2024. Therefore, current PhD students who enrolled prior to September 2024 are not eligible to apply for the award.
Also, applicants should note that our PhD programme only has one entry point each year – in September. Most LLM courses in the UK end with graduation in November. Entry on to our PhD programme is dependent upon your obtaining a certain grade on your LLM so as to meet our PhD academic entry requirements. Also, applicants should note that our PhD programme only has one entry point each year – in September. Most LLM courses in the UK end with graduation in November. Entry on to our PhD programme is dependent upon your obtaining a certain grade on your LLM so as to meet our academic entry requirements. This means for applicants currently taking their LLM in the UK (but not at Queen Mary) where the date of graduation falls after September 2023, and/or for International applicants requiring a UK student visa who are currently taking an LLM in the UK, then an application this year is not possible.
The funding is open to research topics in any area of intellectual property and related rights.
The deadline for Herchel Smith applications to the School of Law is Tuesday 26 March 2024. You must have completed both the main PhD application process, and submitted all your supporting documents, by this date. The selection process will then take place during the next couple of months and be completed in June 2024.
There is a section within the PhD online application form labelled ‘Other information’. To notify us that you wish to apply for our Herchel Smith Studentship award you will need to firstly respond to the question: ‘Are you applying for a specific named funding’ by selecting yes from the drop down menu and then, to the new question that appears, ‘Which specific named funding?’ choose the ‘I am a School of Law - Herchel Smith’ option.
Without this notification, you will not be considered as a funding applicant. You will be treated as an applicant to our PhD programme only.
If you want to apply for Herchel Smith funding and have already submitted your main application (without indicating that you wish to be considered for one of our funding awards) you must contact Mr Gareth Skehan, PhD Admissions Administrator, before the deadline by email on g.skehan@qmul.ac.uk, and state the award that you want to apply for. Without this specific email notification you will not be considered for Herchel Smith funding. If you wish to apply for other Queen Mary funding awards simultaneously, you may do so. If you are unable to indicate this on the online application form, please e-mail g.skehan@qmul.ac.uk with notification by the time of the relevant funding deadline.
Only applicants who have completed the online application process to the PhD programme prior to the funding submission deadline will be considered for funding. For information on how to make an application, what our entry requirements are, and what supporting documentation is required, please see our PhD webpage.
To make an on-line application, you would need to visit this web-page and then click on the button marked ‘full-time’ study on the the webpage – this will take you to a portal to the on-line application system.
Applicants are encouraged to contact an eligible academic staff member to secure supervision prior to submitting their main PhD application, and so prior to the funding deadline date. Whilst applications submitted without supervision agreed will also be considered, it will aid any application for funding if they can show they have already secured supervision by the time the funding selection process takes place.
It is important to make sure that the School of Law has staff whose research interests and expertise complement your research project. Information and guidance for applicants on how to contact academic staff can be found on the main PhD web-page, specifically in the ‘Finding a Supervisor’ section.
If you have any queries relating to the PhD funding application process, please email the School of Law PhD Admissions Administrator, Mr G. Skehan by email on g.skehan@qmul.ac.uk