Supported Application Scheme

To be eligible for the 2022 Supported Application Scheme, you must:

• have no previous experience of university.
• be applying for an eligible undergraduate programme (listed above).
• be UK-Domiciled
• be living in a household with a gross annual income of below £33,000 OR which receives means tested state benefits and/or in receipt of Free School Meals, a 16-19 bursary OR a means tested bursary in a Centre for Young Musicians or Junior Guildhall

You must also meet at least one of the below criteria:

• Have a home postcode which is classified as Quintile 1 or Quintile 2 in the POLAR4 data (visit the Office for Students website to find out, using the postcode checker tool*).
• Have a home postcode which is classified as Decile 1-4 in the Index of Multiple Deprivation (IMD) Government dataset (visit the IMD website to find out, result is in a downloadable spreadsheet, found in column F.)*.
• Be Black, Asian or ethnically diverse.
• Be in care, a recent care leaver or estranged from your family.
• Attend one of our partner schools or youth organisations
• Have a disability, which will be declared on your undergraduate application.

*Alternatively, email wp@gsmd.ac.uk with your home postcode and we will check eligibility for these criteria for you.

Further information on the eligibility criteria can be found in the detailed instructions for applicants and teachers/advisors.

Please check our lists of eligible schools and youth and community organisations to check your eligibility.

Applications for the Supported Application Scheme are now closed for 2022 entry.

You can either apply directly to the programme, or be referred by your school, college, theatre group or youth organisation. You should read the above instructions before submitting an application.

You must apply, or be referred, before you submit your online application to the School – application fees already paid cannot be refunded*. You will be contacted by email if your application to the Scheme has been successful, with instructions on how to proceed with your application to the School. A successful application to the Scheme is not an application to the undergraduate programme.

*If you have already submitted an application to the School, you may still apply to the Scheme and benefit from the support, minus the free application.

• Scheme applications are considered as soon as applications open for each programme. Places are awarded on a first-come, first-served basis, so an early application is recommended. Please note that we cannot process a free application for a programme until applications are open for it.
• We cannot refund application fees once they have been paid, so please do not submit your online application to the School until you have email confirmation of a place on the Scheme. This email will provide instructions on how to submit your free application.
• The Supported Application Scheme is subject to the eligibility requirements above, and we regret that we cannot offer the scheme to applicants who do not meet them.
• The application deadlines for the Scheme are final, and late applications will not be processed.

If you are a teacher or youth worker and you would like more information about the scheme, you can read further instructions.

You can find the Guildhall School’s policy on the Supported Application Scheme.

Please note that places on the Supported Application Scheme are in high demand, particularly for the Acting course. We ask teachers and advisors to use discretion when referring young people for the scheme, prioritising those most in need of the support that the scheme offers, as we may be required to cap the number of participants per school/organisation.