A new Graduate Support Fund is being launched to help the most hard-pressed students at De Montfort University Leicester (DMU) with graduation day costs to ensure they don’t miss out on celebrating the end to their time at university.
Free tickets, free gown hire – or both – are being made available to those students who may have had to pass up the big day in previous years.
The spectacular sector-leading graduation ceremonies at DMU moved to their own purpose-built venue in 2015 and the university invests significantly in the red-carpet events each year to make the ceremonies as truly memorable as possible.
As the VIP guests for the day, all graduates are assured a free ticket for themselves to the ceremony, a free brochure, complimentary drink and other goodies as well as two extra seats allocated at a cost of £15 each.
And for the first time since charging for tickets in 1998, DMU is this year offering support towards the costs of the special occasion. Under the Graduate Support Fund, students can apply for a pair of free tickets, free gown hire – or both.
Jo Cooke, DMU’s Associate Chief Operating Officer and Executive Director of Student and Academic Services, said: “We recognise that sometimes students are unable to attend their graduation ceremony because they are unable to meet the costs of tickets for their guests and gown hire.
“We are therefore offering students who demonstrate the greatest need the opportunity to submit an application to receive either two guest tickets free, their gown hire for free, or both.
“The costs to DMU of holding the ceremonies are only partially met by the sale of tickets, but we are always mindful of the financial pressures on our students and last year we helped by reducing the price of tickets by nine per cent, even though we actually increased spending on our graduation ceremonies by 43 per cent.
“We are now going a step further by launching our Graduate Support Fund to ensure those who might have missed out in previous years are not denied the opportunity to celebrate their fantastic academic accomplishments.”
Those students, for example, who are in receipt of a tuition fee loan, maintenance loan, maintenance grant, NHS bursary or have experienced other financial hardships are urged to apply.
The ceremonies take place at TheVenue@DMU and now include a special Graduation Village were friends and family can gather to soak up the atmosphere. The ceremonies are live-streamed into the Village and across the campus.
Our July 2017 graduation ceremonies will take place between Saturday 15 and Saturday 22 July, and details have now been confirmed for the ceremony schedule. People can apply for the fund from Monday, 10 April, with the deadline at 5pm on Friday, 5 May. A panel will consider all the applications and then communicate their decision no later than 17 May so those that are unsuccessful will still have time to make arrangements before the 22 May deadline for tickets.
Completed forms should be emailed to lynette.williams@dmu.ac.uk or placed in a sealed envelope addressed to ‘Lynette Williams, Gateway House’ and then handed into the reception desk on the ground floor of Gateway House.
Posted on Friday 7 April 2017