Full-time tertiary

To be eligible for a Student Allowance, a student must be a full-time student, or separately approved for study on a 'Limited full-time' basis.

Tertiary programmes have an Equivalent Full-Time Student (EFTS) value assigned to them.

The EFTS value determines if a course of study is full-time or not.

The Verification of Study (VoS) process is used to confirm the EFTS of a student's course of study.

To be full-time, a student must be studying the minimum EFTS in regards to weeks, as outlined in the LET table below.

Loan Entry Threshold (LET) table

Number of weeks (gross weeks)	EFTS	Number of weeks (gross weeks)	EFTS
12	0.3	23	0.575
13	0.3	24	0.6
14	0.3	25	0.625
15	0.3	26	0.65
16	0.4	27	0.675
17	0.4	28	0.7
18	0.4	29	0.725
19	0.4	30	0.75
20	0.5	31	0.775
21	0.525	32-52	0.8
22	0.55	53 or more	1.0

A student may have a period of study which is less than 12 weeks (for example some trimester 3 study). If this is the case, a student is considered to be undertaking full-time study if they are studying at least 0.025 EFTS per teaching week.

Full-time - trimester 3 (summer school) study

Students who are undertaking study in trimester 3 (i.e. study that is undertaken over the summer period) need to meet all general Student Allowance eligibility and entitlement criteria, to qualify for a Student Allowance.

If the trimester 3 study on its own is less than full-time, then the student is not eligible for that period of study.

If the trimester 3 study is attached to their existing or subsequent study programme the student can be eligible for any part of the combined study that is full-time.

Full year courses that are not full-time for the whole year

Students undertaking full-year courses that are not full-time for the whole year can be eligible for any periods of study they are full-time. This can occur where there are combinations of full-year and part-year study within the overall study programme.

Combining periods of study

For Student Allowance purposes, 2 normally unrelated periods of part-time study cannot be combined together as full-time study except where they are conjoint or concurrent study.