Financing

You must have financing in place before beginning your PhD programme; in fact, you have to have financing in place before submitting a formal application for acceptance to a PhD programme.

Funding is out there, whether in the form of stipends from large research projects or from open fellowships. The availability of these types of financing programmes is advertised by NTNU at different times of the year on the vacancies webpage. Business and industry may also be a source of PhD funding.

The level of detail required for a stipend application or fellowship application varies, depending on the different departments, and students should therefore be aware of department recommendations, rules and requirements.

There is also a great deal of variability in the number of stipends that are announced during the course of the year, as well as the number of applicants who seek funding from the different disciplines.

Acceptance to a PhD programme
Once financing is in place, a student may apply for acceptance to a PhD programme. There is a specific form for PhD candidate applications. A study plan and a project plan must be developed in conjunction with the student’s main supervisor.

A detailed description of an application and project plan can be found in the PhD regulations (§ 5.2).