Scope of Policy and Context
Each year Leicester Grammar School awards scholarships and bursaries to help fund the fees of talented pupils who will benefit from the educational opportunities offered by the School. The provision of education is the primary charitable object of the School and our grant making policy aims to improve access to the School for those who would not otherwise be able to enjoy a Leicester Grammar education.

The School's policy is to make awards on the basis of the applicant's educational ability and his or her family's ability to pay.

Scholarships
The School offers a range of scholarships for pupils of outstanding academic, musical, sporting, artistic or all-round potential. These are awarded on the basis of examination and assessment. Awards cover entry at all ages from Year 7 including sixth form entrants.

The fee remission associated with scholarships is not means dependent, but recipients will be asked to consider giving up the financial aspect of the award where it is not required.

In cases of financial hardship, the remission associated with scholarships can be augmented. However this element of the award would be subject to means testing.

Bursary Support
Bursary support is available either for new applicants to the School, or for existing pupils whose circumstances have changed. This is subject to rigorous testing of financial need and limited by the overall bursaries budget.

Individual awards will be dependent on the level of financial need identified, and where the School does not have sufficient funds to meet all its applications funds will be directed to those pupils who are identified as having potential to benefit most from the opportunities Leicester Grammar has to offer, and will be able to contribute to the life of the School.

Funding of Bursaries & Scholarships
Scholarships and Bursaries are funded from charitable donations, commercial activities, and from School fee income. In addition to the non fee sources of funding, the School believes that at least 5% of gross fee income is an appropriate amount to spend on bursaries and scholarships.

Each year the School sets a budget for bursaries and scholarships, based on anticipated sources of funding. Only in exceptional circumstances will the School exceed this limit.

Grant Making Process
Parents should alert the Business Director to any potential bursary requirement during the admissions process. Parents can then request the relevant forms by ticking the appropriate boxes on the application form.

The Business Director and the Headmaster will review applications to assess the level of financial need. This may involve a further telephone conversation or meeting to clarify any ambiguities on the form.

Where financial need is established, applications will be discussed following the January entrance examination and grants will be made based on the potential of pupils and the available bursaries budget. In addition, there is an annual review meeting chaired by the Headmaster, when all bursary awards are reviewed for the academic year ahead.

Parents will be notified of the results of their bursary application; whether successful or unsuccessful.

To enable the School to stick to its cost plans, bursary applications should be made well in advance of the start of the academic year. The School budget is fixed during the preceding Trinity Term.

Bursaries will not be applied retrospectively, and only in exceptional circumstances during the academic year.

Principles applied to means testing
The ultimate obligation to finance school fees lies with the parents of pupils. Financial support in the form of a means tested bursary will only be considered after all other avenues for financing school fees have been exhausted.

All applicants must supply a completed Confidential Statement of Financial Circumstances. No means tested application will proceed until this form has been completed.

Factors taken into consideration when assessing a family's financial situation include:

• Opportunities to release capital either through increased mortgages or sale of investments.
• The ability to improve the earning power of the family. Both partners would be expected to be earning where possible.
• Commitments to the education of other siblings will be taken into account, but where a family has children at other fee-paying schools, Leicester Grammar expects parents to have made bursary applications to the other schools as well.
• The School would anticipate that applicants have asked their extended family for support before requesting a means tested grant.
• The financial circumstances of both natural parents will need to be reviewed. In the case of re-marriage the application should include the step parent's financial information. The obligation of the step parent to his or her natural children will be taken into account.
• As financial circumstances can change during a five year period, all awards are subject to annual review. If there is no material change, awards offered will remain at the same level throughout a pupil's time at the School.

Conditions of awards
Bursary and Scholarship awards are conditional on the recipient playing a full and active part in the life of the School.