Fully Funded International Scholarships for Nigerian Students

It is important to find out if there are available fully funded study abroad scholarships for Nigerian students – secondary school, undergraduates, and graduates.

The cost of education is high in Nigeria, especially for the less privileged and the average earners in the country.

Many parents are passing through hardship, sending their kids to school because of the meager resources available to them as income.

However, there are over 35 companies in Nigeria that offer scholarship to both undergraduate and postgraduate scholarships.

You too can study for free through scholarship!

Scholarships for Nigerian Students

Scholarships are grants or payments made to support a student’s education, awarded based on academic or other achievement.

There are various types of scholarships – the two most common being merit-based and need-based.

The donor or department funding the scholarship sets the criteria for recipient selection, and the grantor specifically defines how the money is to be applied.

The funds are used to defray the costs of tuition, books, room, board, and other expenses directly tied to a student’s educational cost through the university.

Scholarships are typically awarded using a variety of factors, including – but not limited to, academic achievement, departmental and community involvement, employment experience, areas of study, and financial need.

Reasons to Apply for Scholarship in Nigeria

• Provision of funds to cover your tuition fees.
• Scholarships cover other important expenses, such as transportation and lodging.
• Scholarships are great for improving your résumé.
• Winning a scholarship might provide you with professional mentorship and direction from recognized professors and seasoned industry leaders in your field.
• Scholarships provide you with the opportunity to form significant contacts and build professional connections with high-fliers.

Scholarship Process in Nigeria

Scholarship awards have processes, requirements, and stages that prospective awardees must take to be qualified for such awards.

1. Call for Application

Applications are usually invited from qualified students for grants and scholarship awards by the awarding company(s).

This may be done through their website, newspaper, e-mails, and other general publications.

Normally, when a call for an application is made, many students from different parts of the country would apply and the company would screen the tons of applications and invite qualified students for exams or interviews.

The important thing to do here is basically to prepare your documents and apply in record time.

When you pass this stage, you are a step closer to winning.

2. Exam/Interview Stage

The awarding company, through an already set parameter, will determine eligible students from the applications received.

The students will be shortlisted for a qualifying exam, interview, or both in rare cases.

When you are invited for any scholarship exam, get past questions of the same scholarship scheme to acquaint yourself with the exam the company sets.

Most of the companies shortlist students for exams or interviews through email and SMS notifications, while some publish names only on their website.

So, stay connected to information flow to remain updated as the events or stages unfold.

The email or SMS inviting you for the exam would ordinarily state the date, venue, time, exam type, and general conducts of the exam.

Take the exam as a serious business.

Be punctual and observe all the rules of moral conduct expected of them before, during and after the exams.

3. Verification Stage

Companies awarding scholarships do so with utmost carefulness and scrutiny to avoid giving awards or grants to these who do not need or merit it.

The companies, through their employees, visit the schools of prospective awards to confirm their status as students, CGPA and level.

In the application stage, the companies will state the eligibility criteria and that would always form the basis of their verification exercise.

Though most of the companies are rich and multinational oil and gas companies, they do not go about throwing their resources around.

They verify the status of every student who has passed their exam before awarding the student.

They may do this through the office of your Head of Department in the office of the Dean.

It is therefore important that you submit only genuine documents, as the verification exercise normally catches up with those with doctored documents.

At this stage, all you should do is pray, wait, and hope for the best!

4. Awarding Stage

This stage brings happiness to students as it crowns their efforts with success.

The companies, after the exam and student verification stages, would award the scholarships to deserving and successful students.

In making awards, the company may communicate the award notice to the successful students through email, text messages or through a letter sent to the schools of the students.

However, general notification and news of the award will be online.

Now, the award has been clinched, but the award letter does not contain cash!

Therefore, study the award letter carefully to understand the terms and conditions of the award.

The award letter will also inform you of the modality of payment.

Most of the companies will make payments to your personal bank account, whereas some will mandate you to open a special type of account with a specific bank in Nigeria for your payment.

It is in your best interest that you satisfy the demand of the award letter to receive your payments when due.

One of your biggest obstacles on your way to scholarship success is your already won scholarship(s).

Never allow the feeling that you have arrived to engulf or envelop you from vigorously pursuing other many scholarships offers.

There is always an award to be won and there is always more money to be made through it.

Why not want some more?

How to Apply for Scholarship in Nigeria

Here are the right steps to apply for scholarship successfully in Nigeria.

1. Have a Target

As a prospective scholar, you must decide within yourself whether you want to pursue local scholarships or international scholarships.

Your choice should be informed by different considerations.

If you are above 300 level in school, focus on local scholarship because you have spent a substantial part of your study years in the country, and it may not be wise to lose those years to start afresh abroad.

However, as a freshman, you can aim for both local and international scholarships alike.

Also, target the number of scholarships you want to clinch.

2. Get Access to Timely Information

One of the greatest differences between a successful man and a less successful man is the quality of information available to them.

In the same vein, the difference between students who win scholarships and those who don’t is the quality of information available to them.

There are hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of students in different universities in Nigeria, but only very few students know much about students’ scholarships.

Even the very few students who know about it conceal the information from others.

I don’t blame those engaged in such cancelation acts because I know they had paid certain prices which the other students may not want to pay to get quality information.

This situation, though bad, has made average and even below average students to continually win multiple scholarships because they have access to quality and timely information.

I implore you to seek access to quality information at all costs.

Always remember you must sow to reap.

You should, therefore, sow in the scholarship process to enable you reap bountifully at the end.

3. Apply on Time

There is a saying that proper preparation prevents poor performance.

You note that these companies awarding scholarships have a few awards to give out.

So, as they approach the limit, the qualification process toughens.

Early application is the best and I encourage you to observe this rule strictly if you desire to succeed in your quest for a scholarship.

4. Join Legit Scholarship Groups

Scholarship groups are platforms to get coached and mentored on how to win multiple local and international scholarships.

As a member of these platforms, you’ll always receive firsthand, timely and quality information on local and international scholarships opportunities as they unfold.

This prepares and positions you strategically for excellence in your scholarship pursuit.

The truth of the process in scholarship quest is that it is only a student who is informed about a particular offer that may apply and even does so on time.

Therefore, for early application, you must have access to timely and quality information which, unfortunately, is hardly available for free in Nigeria.

5. Use Past Questions

One of the greatest tools use in passing scholarship exams in Nigeria is past questions.

The practice of using past questions as preparation for any scholarship exam gives you a very clear and competitive edge against other students who did not know the secrets.

Past questions will help you in two major ways:

• First, it will expose you to question you should expect in the exam. This will help you prepare in line with what you have seen.
• Second, most examiners do not have time to set new questions and they therefore have recourse to picking old questions with little or no modification.

You will agree with me that the exam would be a walk-over for you if you can study these past questions before your exams and eventually see them in the exams.

6. Apply for Many Scholarships

As you begin your application, apply for as many scholarships as you are eligible for.

This is because you never can tell which one would succeed.

You may lose out if you limit yourself to a few numbers of applications.

The general rule is to keep on applying as long as you are eligible.

It does not hurt your body or spirit.

7. Obey Eligibility Criteria

You may not be qualified for every available scholarship.

Most scholarships set parameters meant to target certain groups or kinds of students.

Certain offers may be level based, CGPA, state, age, JAMB score or course/dept based.

It is your duty to study the eligibility section carefully to determine whether you’re eligible to apply to save precious time, effort and resources which would pursue other offers.

8. Make a List

One who wants to embark on a journey must first decide where he wants to go and the route to his destination.

Similarly, in scholarship pursuit, make out a list of scholarship you wish to pursue.

In so doing, you are expected to note the awarding companies and website, eligibility of the scholarship, the monetary worth and usual application period of the scholarship.

9. Seek Mentorship

There is a very great advantage in learning from those who have gone ahead of you in a particular field.

One of the major advantages is that it helps you to avoid certain mistakes your mentors have made.

So, get an excellent mentor today!

To choose the right mentor, please look out for someone who has result in scholarship pursuit.

The person’s location, age, sex, or designation is immaterial if he or she possess the requisite result and necessary information that will aid you in your quest for scholarships.

10. Prepare your Documents

The importance of planning cannot be over-emphasized in your scholarship application process.

It is not enough to desire multiple scholarship awards; you must make serious and conscious efforts to secure your award.

One of the important things to do, which so many students either knowingly or unknowingly neglect to do, is to gather all the essential documents for scholarship application and to keep them handy.

These documents are considered the basis for online scholarship applications:

• A new coloured passport on a white background.
• Original birth certificate or court age declaration document.
• Original admission letter.
• Original certificate of origin.
• Original student identity card from your school.
• Original copy of WAEC or NECO result.
• Jamb UTME result.
• Proof of CGPA for students in second year and above (last sessional result can serve).

When you gather these basic documents, have them scanned and saved in your email.

This makes the documents handy, as you can simply access them for your timely application through your email – even with your phone.

Preparing your documents in the manner prescribed above saves not only you the cost of scanning every day.

It gives you an advantage and ensures you beat others to the application.

Every scholarship has specific documents required for its application.

It may involve all, more or some ones listed above.

As such, you are expected to read the eligibility section to see the needed documents.

Also, some scholarships may demand that documents used for application must be in specific size and format.

Format may be PDF, JPG, PNG, or JPEG.

It is wise if you comply with these requirements, as you may be disqualified from the process because of such things you may consider unimportant.

Scholarship providers get lots of applications every year and they are looking for the smallest mistake or reason to trash your application.

11. Maintain High CGPA

Winning a scholarship is one thing, sustaining and keeping it is another ball game.

Most times, you hear students win and lose scholarships because of their ignorance.

Yes, you have won the scholarship, but there are terms and conditions you must obey and follow religiously, or your award will be ended.

Each year, the scholarship providers always visit schools to verify the academic status of students on their award list.

Attentively, they may request you to get a letter from your school authorities confirming your academic status in school.

Such letters are usually written by HODs and Deans of Faculties stating your level, department and last CGPA, with the stamp and signature.

Demands like these are mostly made through emails to the beneficiaries of the scholarship.

This is a verification process that takes place yearly and payment of award sums are made to only students who passed the verification exercise.

This is essential to ensure that beneficiaries of scholarship schemes remain students and are committed to making excellent results.

Every scholarship award has terms and conditions upon which the award is made.

Therefore, for the beneficiaries to continue to enjoy the scholarship, they must keep to the terms and conditions of the award.

Usually, the scholarship award letter or email will state the terms and conditions, but here are three general terms:

CGPA

Every scholarship is given for furtherance of education and a good CGPA is proof that the scholarship providers did not make a fatal mistake in awarding you a scholarship.

Therefore, you must always beat the CGPA benchmark of your award to relieve your yearly grant from the provider company.

You should note that the benchmark varies (mostly 3.0 and 3.5 of 5.0) and failure to reach the benchmark will cost you the award.

Studentship

A beneficiary of a scholarship scheme must remain a student to be qualified to receive annual grants from the scholarship providers.

The student must, therefore, not have been expelled by school authorities for any reason.

Moral Conduct

A scholarship beneficiary must be worthy of the award in character and learning.

You must therefore not be involved in acts that are shameful.

If there are verifiable negative reports about a scholar, it may cost him or her a scholarship award.

The above general terms are in addition to other terms, as may be stipulated in your award letter.

It is in your best interest to obey them.

12. Be Prayerful

God blesses whoever he wills and will bless your efforts as you adopt the principles and secrets discussed in this post.

As you embark on your scholarship pursuit, always pray to God for grace to excel above your equals.

Fully Funded Study Abroad Scholarships for Nigerian Students in 2024

• Agbami Scholarship
• David Oyedepo Foundation Scholarship
• Federal Government Scholarship
• Jim Ovia Foundation Scholarship
• MTN Scholarship
• Nigerian Liquefied Natural Gas (NLNG) Scholarship
• NNPC/Seplat Energy Scholarship
• NNPC/Total Scholarship
• OPM Scholarship
• PTDF Scholarship
• Secondary School Scholarship
• Shell Scholarship

Final Words

Scholarships are by far the only simple, cost-free way of studying abroad.

With a bit of luck, this works for everyone.

Whether rich or poor, privileged, or underprivileged.

By relying on scholarships, many Nigerians have been opportune to get quality education.

I wish you success.