The Novice Guide to Becoming a Chevening Scholar [Plus Relevant Resources].

Getting Started With Your Chevening Scholarships Application

When you read about Chevening and you come across the application portal and all these amazing past scholars, there is a possibility you begin to feel like you don’t stand a chance, and you may want to back out. 

“There is no such thing as a ‘typical’ Chevening Scholar, but those who are successful tend to have ambition, leadership qualities, and a strong academic background.”  – Chevening Website

Don’t write yourself off. 

I know that feeling because I was there. I worked on my application for weeks and gave up a day before the official deadline. However, I believe God gave me a second chance when I discovered the deadline was extended for another 2 days. I pulled up my application draft and spent another 18 hours completing the process. If I had further disqualified myself, I would not have published this kind of article. 

Some persons applied once, and some tried a couple of times – and from my observation, it is not solely dependent on the robust professional profile. You need to be able to articulate your responses to satisfy the questions with clear examples; being able to show a clear pattern of progressive professional and leadership development and the need for a Master’s degree. I will address this in detail later in this article. Read on.

Chevening Scholarships Eligibility

To be eligible for a Chevening Scholarship you must:

• Be a citizen of a Chevening-eligible country or territory.
• Return to your country of citizenship for a minimum of two years after your award has ended.
• Have completed all components of an undergraduate degree that will enable you to gain entry into a postgraduate programme at a UK university by the time you submit your application. This is typically equivalent to an upper second-class 2:1 honours degree in the UK but may be different depending on your course and university choice.
• Have at least two years of work experience (equivalent to 2,800 hours).

If you are a Nigerian, your National Youth Service Corps Experience counts.

• Apply to three different eligible UK university courses and receive an unconditional offer from one of these choices by 11 July 2024.

Learn more about eligibility | Learn more about the 2022/2023 Application Timeline.

On English Language Requirement

As of this time, Chevening no longer requires an English Language Test as part of the application process. However, you may still need to meet the language requirement for the individual school you are applying for.

Since I am quite proficient in the English Language, during my application year, I used some online platforms like IELTS Simon, IELTS Buddy, and IELTS Mentor, coupled with the official British Council IELTS Mobile App to study for the exam. I prepped for the exam in less than 1 month and got an Overall Band Score of 7.5. If English is not your first language and/or you are not proficient in it, give yourself enough time to prepare. That way you understand the format of each paper type and the techniques for excelling. This is just an extra tip for you in case your university still requires you to submit a proficiency certificate for the English Language.

In some cases, if you write directly to the admission office, with other proofs, such as publications, writings, and speaking videos, you can get a waiver. 

Recommended Readings

• Work experience: Four key points to help you apply
• English Language Requirement – Chevening’s FAQs
• Application Timeline (2023/2024)

Chevening’s Application Essay Section

This is the core of the process – as you are expected to communicate why you should be selected as a Chevening Scholar. This is an award that receives over 50,000 applications yearly and less than 5% of that number would be selected. Also consider the financial investment of over £30,000, stipend and other allowances inclusive. You need to put your best foot forward. If anyone would invest that amount of money, you must sound convincing.

To have a full grasp of this process, please take your time to go through the official Chevening Application Guidance.

The essay will test you in four areas; Leadership, Networking, Course of Study, and Future Career Goals. You will answer each question with a minimum of 100 words and a maximum of 500 words. 

At this point, I would give some pointers for each essay section – based on how I approached my application.  Let’s dive!

First Thing – Reflection and Milestone Timeline.

The best thing you can do for yourself is to spend 1-2 hours reflecting on your life’s journey and designing what I call your “Milestone Timeline”. This is you tracking your life/professional growth timeline to highlight those significant events in your life and arranging them in chronological order. In this Milestone Timeline, we are highlighting both the positive and the so-called negative events in the form of headlines – recognizing that it’s the combination of these two types of events that shape our story at any given time.

Here is a synoptic example of what my timeline looked like at the time of my application:

• Graduated from High School – 2010
• Continuous struggle with identity, habits and low self-esteem – 2010
• Search for answers and solutions – 2010
• Discovery and excitement to share with other teenagers – 2011
• Created a Facebook Group – Royal Youths Forum – 2011
• Grew to 800 members in One Year – 2011
• Discovered Blogging, started one and later self-coded mine (Seasonedlifejournal.com.ng) – 2012
• Inspired to use my story and experience to teach young people on campus to use technology to drive socio-economic change (Leverage Conference) – 2015
• Started my speaking career in technology for good, leadership development and community development. – 2015
• Launched an ebook – No Excuse Challenge – 2016
• Launched my Digital Agency (To help Innovators and Changemakers use communications technologies for more impact) – 2016 
• Leverage Conference, University of Ibadan – 2016
• Had a major identity breakdown – 2016
• Launched my Book – Lead Your Life – 2017
• Got Selected as an Obama, Young African Leader, West Africa – 2017
• Volunteered to offer technical support to the first YALI RLC, West Africa, Nigeria Alumni Chapter. Election – 2017
• Unanimously Appointed as Communications Chair of YALI RLC, West Africa, Nigeria Alumni Chapter. – 2017
• Worked with 4 other YALI RLC alumni to start a YALI Lagos Network Community – 2017
• Hosted a local meetup of the UN Foundation – Social Good Summit – 2017
• Leverage Conference, Lagos – 2017
• Published over 150 articles, over 520,000 views and 50,000 all-time readers on Seasoned Life Journal- 2018
• Merged Seasoned Life Journal with another organization to become The Leverage Africa – 2018
• Nominated as Associate Fellow, Royal Commonwealth Society – 2018
• Founded SocialGood Lagos, with 2 amazing friends – in 2018
• Served as a Delegate of UN Foundation +SocialGood Community at International Government Communications Forum, UAE – 2018
• Bramo Digi was awarded as Top 100 Emerging SMEs in Nigeria (Union Bank – Connect Nigeria – after working with over 30 social change brands in 4 West African Countries – in 2018
• Hosted second SocialGood Summit Lagos- 2018
• Selected as Global People’s Fellow – 2018
• Selected as an Ashoka Emerging Innovator – 2018

Remember, I said I didn’t think I stood a chance? After this exercise, I was like “Thank You, Jesus! At 23 years old, I am so proud of who I have become!” And I got the confidence to put my application forward. 

I learnt a significant lesson.  Many of us do not even appreciate our journey and choose to make other people the heroes! Honestly, I may have been comparing myself with some of my friends who do amazing stuff! This doesn’t change the fact that my story is also valid. With gratitude and proper reflection, we would see that we were not as bad as we thought! 

This exercise helped me to find the consistent theme and focus of my passion, projects and business in those years. And it’s about Leadership and Technology – I have been committed to programs and projects that improve the leadership skills (on personal, organizational and community levels) of young people; and to helping these innovators and changemakers use communication technologies to amplify the impact of their work (a.k.a technology for SocialGood).

I also think this is relevant for those who have several entrepreneurial branches like me. Even though you may not have all figured it out yet, you need to be clear about the niche you are committed to from the start – so that you can build your story across each essay.

This is a very important exercise to help you dig out your leadership journey. You will be shocked by the kind of clarity you will get from this exercise. You can choose to design yours visually, in audio format or in whatever form appeals to you.

Leadership

Chevening is looking for individuals who will be future leaders or influencers in their home countries. Explain how you meet this requirement, using clear examples of your own leadership and influencing skills to support your answer.

What the reviewer would like to see here is your philosophy of leadership (in one or two lines), a clear example showing how you live up to your definition of leadership, and why that should qualify you for a Chevening Scholarship.

In giving an example, there are two ways you may want to approach this; you can use your milestone timeline (like I described above) to arrange your story in a connected and more narrative style. This was what I did – I picked 3 major milestones from my timeline and connected them – How I started Seasoned Life Journal; how it led to me starting Leverage Conference – and how that also led to me starting my Digital Agency (Bramo Digi). But my awards and recognition came in the last paragraph before my closing hook.

The other approach is to give a background story and narrow it down to 1 or 2 projects you have done or 1 or 2 professional scenarios in your career journey.

Whichever approach you use, make sure you highlight your contribution to the successful outcome of that event. The safest way to do this is by using the STAR APPROACH.  What this means is to simply:

1. Describe the Situation and when did it take place.
2. Explain the Task and what was the objective
3. Give details about the Action you took to achieve this.
4. Close with the Result of your action.

Then you can follow up with a line of sentences highlighting what you learnt from that experience. I have included links below for further study and explanation.

Networking

Chevening is looking for individuals with strong professional relationship-building skills, who will engage with the Chevening community and influence and lead others in their chosen profession. Please explain how you build and maintain relationships in a professional capacity, using clear examples of how you currently do this and outline how you hope to use these skills in the future (minimum word count: 100 words; maximum word count: 500 words).

Similar to the leadership essay, what the reviewer would like to see here is what networking means to you (in one or two lines), how you build relationships and a clear example of how you have strategically benefitted from these relationships.

You may be tempted to want to share all the amazing connections you have, but you must understand why this question is relevant. One of the project objectives of Chevening is to “develop and nurture relationships between the UK and former Scholars. This allows the UK to engage with and invest in future leaders, helping us to work better together in the future.” You have to show that you can build long-term relationships with the Chevening network and the potential to be lifelong friends with the United Kingdom. 

I recommend you show how you have used networking to drive the goals and leadership impact you described in your leadership essay; each essay question is an opportunity to elaborate more on who you are.

Course of Study

Outline why you have selected your chosen three university courses, and explain how this relates to your previous academic or professional experience and your plans for the future. Please do not duplicate the information you have entered on the work experience and education section of this form (minimum word count: 100 words, maximum word count: 500 words).

I did this with four (4) paragraphs – the introductory paragraph; 3 paragraphs outlining the relevance of each choice course and school; and a closing paragraph. I had to use my introductory paragraph to once again establish the transition from my first degree (which was a double major in Physics and Education) to my current interests, and how the need for a master’s degree will help enhance my academic and professional qualifications in media and communications, and how it links to my current work in international development.

Just for the record – I studied Media Practice for Development and Social Change at the University of Sussex. 

Please try to avoid sounding like the information you see in your course module on the school’s website. Try to simplify the relevance of that module to your career interests. Research the school, the course, and even the professors convening the courses. 

Once again, the key thing here is to offer insight into how these 3 courses will enhance your ability and capacity to further your career aspirations. 

Must Read-  University applications: four key points to help you apply.