Financial help to study in Florence, Italy

Pauleeeeeeee

I'm extremely interested in studying fine art abroad at 1 of two specific schools in Florence, Italy. The problem is of course, cost.
Both schools offer scolarships for students going into the second years of the course but this is only based upon an excellent end of year portfolio, overall performance and financial need at the time.

Each term at the schools are about €3000 each. There's a total of 3 terms per year which equals out to €9000 per year. On top of that there's rent and living expenses aswell.

If anyone has any suggestions on the best routes to getting financial help for all this I'd really appreciate it. I'm talking along the lines of arts grants, educational loans, etc...

Thanks!

Pauleeeeeeee

Pauleeeeeeee wrote: »

I'm extremely interested in studying fine art abroad at 1 of two specific schools in Florence, Italy. The problem is of course, cost.
Both schools offer scolarships for students going into the second years of the course but this is only based upon an excellent end of year portfolio, overall performance and financial need at the time.

Each term at the schools are about €3000 each. There's a total of 3 terms per year which equals out to €9000 per year. On top of that there's rent and living expenses aswell.

If anyone has any suggestions on the best routes to getting financial help for all this I'd really appreciate it. I'm talking along the lines of arts grants, educational loans, etc...

Thanks!

Hi Pauleeeeee(I didnt count how many eeee's so I'm just guessing),

If it's an undergraduate course and if it's your first course at this level, then you may be entitled for a grant similar to someone studying in Ireland. However, the cost of the course won't be covered by the Council/VEC which is dissimilar to the system in Ireland. But yes, that's certainly something you should look into.

As for education loans, unfortunately nothing large usually is available here (compared to other countries), and you will need a guarantor for your loans.

As for art grants, I haven't a clue where to begin. It might be worth throwing up a post over on the Art & Architecture forum? It's possible that someone more knowledgeable might be able to help you out.

Pauleeeeeeee

Myth wrote: »

Hi Pauleeeeee(I didnt count how many eeee's so I'm just guessing),

If it's an undergraduate course and if it's your first course at this level, then you may be entitled for a grant similar to someone studying in Ireland. However, the cost of the course won't be covered by the Council/VEC which is dissimilar to the system in Ireland. But yes, that's certainly something you should look into.

As for education loans, unfortunately nothing large usually is available here (compared to other countries), and you will need a guarantor for your loans.

As for art grants, I haven't a clue where to begin. It might be worth throwing up a post over on the Art & Architecture forum? It's possible that someone more knowledgeable might be able to help you out.

Thanks for replying Myth. It's not an undergraduate course as such...I won't bore you with the details as to why not. I have a feeling that because it's not 100% recognised by the Council/VEC they wouldn't give me a minutes thought.

Regarding education loans, I know, it's a bit of a joke. In the USA students come out of college with debt up to 100k (not that I want to be in that kind of debt) and no one bats an eyelid. A bank manager here would probably have a fit here if anything more than a few grand was to be asked for.

I think my only hope would be to apply to the arts council for some funding. The maximum I would be able to get for what I want to do, according to their website anyway, would be €12k for the year. I've looked though how much they've given out last year to people in the same category and the very max that was given out was €9k and that was for something related to theatre.

Bascially, it's not looking too good