Am I eligible?

You will be eligible if your parents/carers have not previously completed an undergraduate degree, at a university or polytechnic, either in the UK or overseas. 

You are also eligible if your parents/carers have: 

• started but not completed an undergraduate degree 
• a higher education certificate (HNC) or higher education diploma (HND) from a university, but not a degree 
• an Open University or similar distance learning degree 
• a work-based degree on a part-time basis 
• an undergraduate degree, but you are estranged from them, with little or no contact. 

We determine which geographical areas meet this definition by using your permanent home postcode (as on your UCAS application) and measuring this against data provided by the government.  

To check your eligibility, look up your postcode.

When assessing household income, we follow the Student Finance England guidance to assess annual taxable income, for the previous financial year. The amount is based on gross taxable income, any non-taxable income or benefits are not included in the total amount. 

You can demonstrate that you are eligible in one of the following ways: 

• You are/were eligible for free school meals at any point during  your secondary education  
• You receive the 16-19 Bursary Fund or Learner Support because your income is £25,000 or below (a referee from your school or college must confirm this). Please note that bursaries or scholarships for school fees for independent schools are not covered by this criteria. 
• Your parent / carer can complete our Declaration of Household Income Form, if you are not in receipt of Free School Meals or the 16-19 Bursary Fund. You can download a Declaration of Household Income (only when applications are open) from the Access to Leeds webpage on how to apply. Please contact the Access to Leeds team if you are living independently without a parent or guardian.  
• You can provide other evidence of your household income such as a wage slip or benefits statement. 

All information you provide will be stored securely and treated confidentially, in line with our data protection and privacy policy. If your income for the current year will be significantly lower than the previous tax year, we may be able to take this into account.

Please email the Access to Leeds team via accesstoleeds@leeds.ac.uk to discuss this with us. 

We look at the Attainment 8 score for the school at which you took your GCSE exams for the year in which you took them and compare this with the England average (or equivalent for the rest of the UK).  

If you changed schools during your GCSEs or have completed examinations over more than one year, we can use the results from any year and school in which you sat a GCSE examination. If you completed your GCSEs in 2020 or 2021, we will use school performance data from 2019 to assess your eligibility. 

School and college performance information for England showing the Attainment 8 data for 2025 may be found on the Government school performance webpages. You should find your school and then click on “Secondary” to navigate to the Attainment 8 score. 

Please note that independent fee-paying schools are not eligible under this criterion even if they show a lower than average Attainment 8 score.

If you have any queries please email the Access to Leeds team via accesstoleeds@leeds.ac.uk. 

We consider each application on an individual basis, so we cannot provide an exhaustive list of situations that meet this criterion. However, they could include: 

• caring responsibilities/being a young carer 
• a recent close family bereavement 
• estranged from your parents/carers 
• mental or physical health condition/disability 
• being from a military service family 
• refugee or asylum seeker status 
• challenging personal, home or school circumstances. 

By “impact” we mean that the situation has affected, or continues to affect, your attendance, academic performance, ability to do your best, or to participate fully in wider school life. We would not normally consider circumstances for which reasonable adjustments have already been made.  

We would generally consider circumstances that have occurred from GCSE studies onwards and/or during sixth form, unless there has been a significant, ongoing impact from an earlier point. 

We will treat any information you provide with the strictest confidence in line with our data protection and privacy policy. Please be aware that, if you apply under this criterion, we may need to contact your referee if we need more information.

You will be eligible under this criterion if you: 

• are a care leaver; that is you have spent at least 13 weeks in local authority care spanning your 16th birthday (if this applies to you, you will also be eligible under our personal circumstances criteria)
• have spent any amount of time in local authority care (such as foster care or residential care), formal kinship care, or have been adopted from care. 
• were on a child protection plan at any point after the age of 11.

Find out more about other support for care experienced students that you might be eligible for.