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Social scholarship

The social scholarship may be awarded to a student who is in a difficult financial situation.

A social scholarship in an increased ammount may be awarded only in particularly justified circumstances, indicated in the Rules and Regulations of Student Benefits which are as follows:

  • orphanhood or half-orphanhood of the applicant who has not reached the age of 26 years
  • disability of at least two household members
  • claiming or remaining of the applicant for the maintenance of a family receiving the support of a social assistance centre in the form of permanent benefits or regular allowances in accordance with the Law of 12. 3. 2004. on social assistance
    (PLEASE NOTE: These are only permanent or interim payments from social assistance! These are not family benefits, type 500+, child benefit, care allowance!)

In the case of foreign nationals, only the following are eligible to apply for a social scholarship (applies only to those enrolled from the 2019/2020 academic year):

  1. citizens of the European Union (EU) or European Free Trade Association (EFTA) countries or citizens of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland referred to in Article 10 section 1 letter b or d of the Agreement on the withdrawal of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland from the European Union and the European Atomic Energy and members of their families residing in the territory of Poland:
    a) being a self-employed person or an employee referred to in Article 2 points 5 and 7 of the Act of 14 July 2006 on the entry into, stay in and departure from the territory of the Republic of Poland of citizens of the Member States of the European Union and their family members (Journal of Laws of 2021 item 1697),
    b) who retain the right of residence in the cases referred to in Article 17 of the Act referred to in point a,
    c) having the right of permanent residence
    – and members of their families residing in the territory of the Republic of Poland.

    Family members are persons listed in Article 2 point 4 of the Act of 14 July 2006 on the entry into, stay in and departure from the territory of the Republic of Poland of citizens of the Member States of the European Union and their family members (Journal of Laws of 2021 item 1697).  - valid from 1st October 2023

  2. have been granted a permanent residence permit or the status of a long-term resident of the European Union,
  3. have been granted a temporary residence permit on account of circumstances referred to in Article 159 section 1 or Article 186 section 1 point 3 or 4 of the Act of 12 December 2013 on foreigners (consolidated text: Journal of Laws of 2018, item 2094, as amended),
  4. have refugee status granted in the Republic of Poland or enjoy temporary protection or supplementary protection in the territory of the Republic of Poland,
  5. have the certificate confirming the knowledge of Polish language as a foreign language referred to in Article 11a section 2 of the Act of 7 October 1999 on Polish language (consolidated text: Journal of Laws of 2019, item 1480, as amended), at least at C1 language proficiency level,
  6. hold the Pole’s Card (Karta Polaka) or received a decision confirming Polish origin,
  7. they are a spouse, ascendant or descendant of a Polish citizen living in the territory of the Republic of Poland,
  8. have been granted a temporary residence permit on account of circumstances referred to in Article 151 section 1 or Article 151b section 1 of the Act of 12 December 2013 on foreigners, or stay in the territory of the Republic of Poland in relation to scientist’s short-term mobility on terms set out in Article 156 section 1 of this Act or have national visa for the purposes of carrying out scientific research or development works.
Deadlines for receiving applications

Applications for the social scholarship for the academic year 2023/24 will be accepted from: 5 to 19 October 2023

Recommended way of submitting the application: by post or via ePUAP (submission of attachments – according to the information provided in the tab: Generating and submitting the application through USOS).

Applications for this benefit submitted after the deadline will continue to be considered. According to the Rules and Regulations of Student Benefits, students will receive the grant starting from the month during which they filed the application, without compensation for the preceding months.

Income threshold

The monthly per capita income in the family, calculated in accordance with the Law on Higher Education and Science and the Law on Family Benefits respectively, cannot exceed 1294,40 PLN.

Generating and submitting the application through USOS

The social scholarship may be awarded only to a student who submitted the application through USOS.

USOSweb

In in order to apply for the grant, please, log in to the main page of the USOSweb by using the SGH student login and password (students receive their SGH login credentials once enrolled for the first year of studies at SGH, which are sent to the email address provided by them in the recruitment process).

  1. To create an application, the bank account number of an applying student must be first entered to the dedicated tab:  Common section – My data – bank account and tax office.
  2. Then, the applicant is required to complete the income statement for the 2023/24 academic year in the USOSweb system. Please, follow the below route to find the statement: Common section - APPLICATIONS – list of applications – Current applications – Income statement for the academic year 2023/24.
  3. Finally, the grant application is generated by following the below route in USOSweb: Common section - APPLICATIONS – list of applications – Current applications - Application for the social scholarship.

All faculties at all universities except SGH WARSAW SCHOOL OF ECONOMICS (also abroad) where you have ever studied / had the status of a student should be provided when filling out the application in the USOS system, even if the study period lasted only a few days, weeks or 1 month, even if you did not attend classes and were crossed out.

The faculties indicated by the student are checked with the national POL-on system. If you do not specify all faculties in the application, the procedure will be resumed and if you exceed the deadline laid down in Article 93 (4) to (5) of the Higher Education and Science Act, the grant will be withdrawn.

The registration of your application in USOSweb is only a technical operation. If you fail to submit your application in a paper version or via the electronic submission box, this means you have not applied for the grant.

The income statement and social scholarship application should be printed and signed. The income statement and the grant application must be printed without the “NOT APPROVED” (NIEZATWIERDZONE) watermark, i. e. they ought to be printed only after pressing the ‘REGISTER’ button. Applications and statements labelled as ‘NOT APPROVED’ shall not be accepted.

Applications should be submitted in paper format to Student Support. 

  • If you submit your application by post or at the Student Support, print it out, sign it by hand and submit it on paper,
  • If you submit it via the SGH electronic submission box, download and sign it with a qualified electronic signature, a signature via a trusted profile (trusted signature) or a personal signature, and send it via the SGH electronic submission box (ESP: /SGH/SkrytkaESP, as an attachment to the form “general letter to a public body”). 

Instead, the sole grant application can also be filed by the ePUAP platform and the required appendices need to be then filed separately as sent by registered mail or couriered to the above given address of the Student Support.

If the documents are mailed via Poczta Polska (The Polish Post) or postal operators providing universal postal services in other Member State of the European Union, the Swiss Confederation or an EFTA Member State - party to the Agreement on the European Economic Area, the postmark date shall serve as a proof. In case of documents sent via other postal operators (e.g. inPost, other foreign operators, courier companies) - the date of the effective application submission to the Student Support is decisive. 

We do not accept scholarship applications filed by e-mail.

Documents to be attached to the application should be originals.

After submitting the application in paper format or via ePUAP, its status ought to be regularly monitored in the USOSweb university system. Any response of the Student Benefit Board regarding the filed application (calls to complete the missing information in documents, decisions, notifications on leaving the application unprocessed), shall be sent by electronic means using the USOSweb system (tab: “list of documents”). It is inapplicable to additional calls/notifications and letters by the Student Benefit Board of Appeal that shall be sent via regular post.

List of documents for a social scholarship application

List of documents for a social scholarship application 2023/2024:

Mandatory enclosures:

Other documents: 

Obligation to obtain a certificate from a Social Assistance Centre (OPS) if the per capita income is below PLN 600

(CHANGE OF TYPE OF CERTIFICATE FROM A SOCIAL ASSISTANCE CENTRE (OPS) FROM 1st Oct 2023)
Due to the entry into force of 1st October 2023 the new wording of para. 4 and 5 of Article 88 of the Act of 20 July 2018 – Law on Higher Education and Science (Journal of Laws of 2018, item 1668 as amended), since the academic year 2023/24 there have been significant changes in the granting of social scholarships and the required documentation from a Social Assistance Centre (OPS).
With the application for a social scholarship, the student must submit a certificate from the Polish social welfare centre (OPS) or social services centre (centrum usług społecznych) stating that the student or his family members used social welfare benefits during the year of application. The certificate must be submitted by all students whose monthly income per person in the family does not exceed PLN 600,00, also foreigners and financially independent persons.

The absence of a certificate will result in the refusal to grant a social scholarship.

This certificate must be issued by the Polish social welfare centre/centre for social services within the 3 months preceding the month of submission of the application.
In all cases where a student (including a foreigner) or his family members do not receive social assistance benefits, Article 88(5) of the above-mentioned Act shall apply:
Article 88(5): If the student referred to in para. 4, or members of his or her family do not benefit from social assistance, the Rector, Student Benefit Board or Student Benefit Board of Appeal. may award the student a social scholarship if the student documented the family’s sources of maintenance (these are additional sources, not listed in the income statement, on the basis of which the income per person was calculated in the USOSweb system).

The income statement

Only one income statement per academic year must be completed for all maintenance grant applications. 

The income statement must include income from the base year (2022 is the base year for the 2023/24 academic year) as well as any income that was not earned in the 2022 base year and commenced after 1 January 2023, as long as it is ongoing at the date of application (e.g. if the person was not working in 2022 and did not start work until after 1 January 2023, or if the person was working in 2022 but lost employment and started another job after 1 January 2023).

If there has been a change in family income or family composition between the submission of a maintenance grant application and the submission of a subsequent application for that grant, the income statement must be updated and a document certifying the change in income/family composition must be submitted.

A subsequent grant application must be accompanied by an updated income statement. The income statement (printout from USOS) must be submitted each time, even if it was already submitted with the previous maintenance grant application in the same academic year. 

Amount of benefit

The amounts of social scholarships are as follows:

  • social scholarships: grant = base amount less per capita income,
  • social scholarships in an increased amount: grant = base amount less per capita income + a boost amount of PLN 300 per month. 
Student Benefit Board and Student Benefit Board of Appeal

Student Benefit Board is appointed by the Rector. According to the Rules and Regulations of Student Benefits committee may consist only of university employees and students. The vast majority of places must be occupied by the students. A general oversight over the activities of the Committee is supervised by the Vice-Rector for Teaching and Student’s Affairs.

Decisions on the social scholarships are taken by the Student Benefit Board.

Appeals against the decision of the Student Benefit Board should be submitted to the Student Benefit Board of Appeal.

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Student Benefit Board
e-mail: komisja-stypendialna@sgh.waw.pl

Student Benefit Board of Appeal
e-mail: komisja-odwolawcza@sgh.waw.pl

Legal acts

REGULAMIN ŚWIADCZEŃ DLA STUDENTÓW

Ustawa z 27 lipca 2005 r. – Prawo o szkolnictwie wyższym

Ustawa z 20 lipca 2018 r. – Prawo o szkolnictwie wyższym i nauce

Student Support
al. Niepodległości 162, room 156 a
02-554 Warszawa

phone: 22 564 66 17, 22 564 66 19
e-mail: stypendia@sgh.waw.pl

Office hours:
Monday/Wednesday/Friday: 9:00am-12:00 (noon)
Tuesday/Thursday: 12:00pm - 3:00pm
The staff of the Student Support responds to phone calls only during the above given office hours.