The objective is to provide an incentive for PhD and MD/PhD students to acquire external stipends. External stipends are usually lower and therefore less attractive than PhD salaries provided by BNITM according to the public service scale. They are, however, beneficial for the institute because they relieve the respective budgets. Therefore, VdF raises external stipends to the level of salaries of the public service scale including all social benefits.

There are limitations to the programme. It does not apply to MD students, who commonly have less laborious doctoral theses and considerably shorter time requirements.

Regulations:

• The annual budget of the programme is limited to 25,200 €.
• The total amount of monthly allowances (stipend plus top- up) should not exceed 2,300 €.
• The maximum support is 350 € per month. Thus, up to six stipend holders may at any time receive the maximum support.

• Where applicable, additional stipend holders may be supported, if necessary, with reduced payments to make full use of the annual budget. It applies the order of the application date (first come, first serve).
• To facilitate the administration, individual adjustments of monthly payments will, with respect to the budget limitations, be rounded down to 10 € amounts.

The regulations are effective beginning on April 1, 2021.

There is no legal claim to a stipend top-up.