About PhD Scholarships at Melbourne University

Like most academics, I get an enormous amount of emails from students asking for a PhD scholarship. Here are some things that you should know:

• It is very unusual for mathematicians in Australia to have their own funding for PhD scholarships.
• Almost all PhD scholarships are awarded by my University. Most are directly funded by the government or by university money. A small number may be available for applicants from specific institutions or countries, due to special programs or agreements.
• My faculty ranks applicants using a complicated formula that involves, but is far from completely determined by, merit. I am not at liberty to say what else in involved in this ranking. Furthermore, my school (department) has no power of veto with this process. Neither do I.
• The result is a score. The cutoff for getting a scholarship is surprisingly high, especially for international applicants, and is not consistent from year to year or even across the two rounds advertised each year.
• So if you want to apply for a PhD under my supervision, you are really applying to the University. This requires you to get some "in-principle" agreement from me. To get this, you'll need to send me your academic transcripts, not your CV/résumé, any theses that you have written, and a specific statement addressing why you wish to work with me.
• I need these because I need to judge if you are serious, if you have the background required, and if you are likely to score high enough to have a chance at a scholarship.

I am sorry to say that if you send me a generic enquiry that doesn't help me with this judgement, then I'm extremely unlikely to respond. It's nothing personal — I just get so many generic enquiries that even copy-pasting a generic reply is beyond my patience threshold.

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