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Apply now to become a 2025 Laidlaw Scholar

25 November 2024

Applications are open for an opportunity to work with a leading academic and have a real-world impact while developing your research and leadership skills.

Laidlaw

Are you a first year undergraduate student, passionate about research? Ready to solve real-world problems? If you’re a leader in the making, read on…

The Laidlaw Undergraduate Research and Leadership Scholarship programme aims to develop a new generation of leaders who are skilled researchers, embrace data-based decision making, and believe it is a moral imperative to lead with integrity.

It invests in talented and motivated first year undergraduate students – giving you the knowledge, skills and experience to become active global citizens and future leaders in your chosen field.

Applications are open until Monday 13 January 2025. Join an information session for new applicants on Tuesday 3 December.

As a 2025 Laidlaw Scholar, you would:

  • Carry out a research project of your choice;
  • Develop your leadership skills;
  • Put your leadership knowledge into practice in an immersive Leadership-in-Action experience;
  • Connect with extraordinary peers in world-leading universities; and
  • Get paid! 

Projects on offer

32 projects are available from across all faculties, led by supervisors working at the forefront of their disciplines. Topics range from:

  1. Political participation, conflict victimisation and gender
  2. Teaching tactile skills to robots using imitation learning
  3. Climate change in Earth’s polar regions from remote sensing observations
  4. Optimisation of a diagnostic assay for HIV monitoring
  5. Foreign language education in Europe

Click to see the full list of UCL projects.

How to apply

First year undergraduate students can apply until Monday 13 January 2025. 

When you have chosen which project you wish to apply for make sure you read it thoroughly and think about the issues involved.  You will need to complete an online form and demonstrate that you meet the Essential Criteria listed for your chosen project, or have sufficiently developed your own project idea.  

Project outputs must be completed by the end of the summer 2025.  

See further information and links to the application and academic reference forms.

Read and watch case studies with past students where they share their experience as a Laidlaw Scholar. 

Further information

See the Laidlaw Research and Leadership Programme website for full application details, FAQs and case studies of our past Scholars’ experiences.

Links