Carnegie Education Fund

12/05/2026

🎺 Carnegie Masters Grants now open for applications

📚️ Are you considering postgraduate study at a Scottish university?

🚩 Are you ordinarily resident in Scotland?

💰️ Carnegie Masters Grants help students in Scotland meet the costs of postgraduate study and make its benefits accessible.

Find out more here: https://carnegie-trust.org/award-schemes/carnegie-masters-grants/

23/03/2026

📻 To celebrate our 125th anniversary, last year we commissioned David Stenhouse FRSA to put together a series on our historic grantees, to bring their stories to life.

🗺️ In their footsteps: Carnegie Pioneers is the result, and the first episode is now available on Apple Podcasts, exploring the life of Jennie Lee, one of the first female MPs, the first Minister of the Arts and a founding figure behind The Open University.

🎓 Future episodes will cover the likes of SNP maverick Winnie Ewing, founder of Scottish Opera, Sir Alexander Gibson and boundary-breaking lawyer Madge Easton Anderson, among many others.

🧑‍🎓 Each episode is presented by a current grantee of CEF, with the wonderful Nithya Chandrasekaran of Robert Gordon University taking up the reins this time around.

⏰ Stay tuned for future episodes across the course of this year, click the link below to have a listen to this first entry:

https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/carnegie-pioneers-jennie-lee/id1886769191

23/03/2026

23/03/2026

A big thank you to everyone who attended our 125th anniversary celebration, where we celebrated the stories of our grantees from across the years - it was a wonderful night. In line with our new strategy, we will be building out our offer to our grantees old and new - stay tuned for more as we develop this page across the course of 2026.

06/03/2026

We're changing to become the Carnegie Education Fund: learn more here

“[it is] my duty and one of my highest privileges to administer the wealth which has come to me…[to help] by rendering attendance at these Universities and the enjoyment of their advantages more available to the deserving and qualified youth…to whom the payment of fees might act as a barrier.....

03/03/2026

Our very first grant scheme was created, along with the Trust, in 1901.

Then titled 'Undergraduate Fee Assistance', it allowed anyone who was 'qualified and deserving' to apply for funding to attend university at one of the then four universities in Scotland (St Andrews, Edinburgh, Glasgow and Aberdeen), covering their fees.

Over time, and with a changing funding environment, the nature of the scheme has changed, now students can apply for an Undergraduate Tuition Fee Grant. With free university tuition in Scotland, it goes to those who don't meet the criteria given by SAAS, currently funding around 300 people per year.

To find out more about our funding and how it could help you, visit our website here:

17/02/2026

🔍Did you know?🔎

By 1910, the Trust covered the costs of tuition fees for around half of the student body of University of St Andrews, University of Aberdeen, University of Glasgow and The University of Edinburgh - as well as lecture theatres, laboratories, university libraries and student residences.

More students were attending higher education in Scotland than ever before and the effects proved to be transformative, leading to a number of long term impacts down the line, and especially after the UK government passed the S*x Disqualification (Removal) Act in 1919, allowing many thousands of women to enter the professional classes.

10/02/2026

From its inception, the patronage given by the Trust wasn't just about access to higher education, but improvement of the facilities through which that education was delivered.

The Trust gave frequently to the four ancients to build the likes of libraries, student accommodation, dedicated research facilities and more, transforming the face of higher education in Scotland at a point where it had been struggling.

You can find out more about the impact on the University of St Andrews in particular via this very helpful article here:

04/02/2026

This is an excellent example of our early funded projects, and many more such examples exist across Scotland, particularly at the four ancients (University of Aberdeen, University of The University of Edinburgh, St University of St Andrews and University of Glasgow). The mission of the Trust wasn't just to improve access to the universities of Scotland, but to improve them as well - often through the funding of new buildings.

We've got a fantastic image of New King's from just after it opened in 1913 for today's . The construction was largely funded by the Carnegie Trust which was founded by philanthropist and industrialist Andrew Carnegie, the University's Rector from 1911-1914.

Inspired by Andrew Carnegie’s belief in the power of knowledge for the public good, we are delighted to welcome Dr Suzanne O’Sullivan, consultant in clinical neurophysiology and neurology, as the speaker for our 2026 Carnegie Lecture.

You can find out more about the Lecture and book your place here: http://abdn.io/1Wk