Students with caring responsibilities

We understand student carers to be students who provide unpaid care for a child, family member or friend. The person cared for might be a child under the age of 18, or a person with an illness or disability, mental health condition or an addiction. Although range and scale of caring responsibilities will vary greatly, the Carers Trust gives several examples of what caring might include:

• Practical tasks, such as cooking, housework and shopping.
• Physical care, such as helping someone out of bed.
• Personal care, such as helping someone dress.
• Helping to give someone their medication.
• Managing the family budget.
• Collecting prescriptions and managing medication.
• Helping someone communicate.
• Looking after brothers and sisters.
• Providing emotional support.

Please note that most of the support listed below is not conditional on satisfying this specific definition.

Undergraduate applicants

If you are currently studying at a state school or college in the UK and live more than 50 miles away from the LSE campus, you may be eligible to apply for the LSE Travel Fund. The LSE Travel Fund contributes towards the cost of standard rail or coach travel to and from the LSE campus for eligible prospective undergraduate students attending our Undergraduate Offer Holders' days, LSE Taster Courses or Undergraduate Open Days.

LSE operates a contextual admissions process. When our admissions selectors review applications, they consider an applicant’s personal and educational circumstances, as well as achievement and potential. This applies both when making offers and when confirming them after results day. If you think that your caring responsibility has had an impact on your education, we encourage you to mention this to your referee. This way, they can include this in the “Applicant context” section of your reference for the attention of the admissions selector. You can also complete an Extenuating Circumstances form if this has caused significant educational disruption or disadvantage. You can find out more about our undergraduate admission processes on our Admissions information webpage.

Postgraduate applicants

We do not run a contextual admissions process at postgraduate level, but our assessors take a holistic view of all applications. Therefore, when completing the application form, we encourage you to include any information about how your personal circumstances have impacted on your education to date.

You do not have to tell us that you have a caring responsibility. However, if you do, we might be able to support you if and when you need it.

The easiest way for you to tell us about your caring responsibility is via the Registration Portal. Ahead of each year of your studies, you will be sent a link to this portal and asked to fill in your registration information, including a question about any caring responsibilities you may have. Alternatively, you can reach out to us at ard.lsecares@lse.ac.uk.

The School provides a 25% subsidy towards the standard nursery rates for the three nurseries we have entered into partnerships with. Please click here to see the process for LSE students. You can access the Student Agreement Form here.

The excellent Turtles Nursery (rated Outstanding by Ofsted) can offer emergency care provision for our students who need additional childcare support at short notice. Please contact Turtles direct to arrange this.

You can find more details about the nursery partnership on the LSE Nursery partnerships website. If you have any questions about the information provided in this section, please contact LSE’s HR team at humanresources@lse.ac.uk.

If you are planning to stay in LSE halls of residence during your studies, our Residential Services team can offer the following support:

• An Accommodation Bursary comprised of a reduction of up to £2,500 in your accommodation fees, if you’re an eligible undergraduate student.
• Support from our in-house warden teams throughout the year. This includes advice, guidance, and support with navigating life at LSE, plus connections to activities and services available to our students.

After you have accepted your offer to study at LSE, you can book your room via the LSE Student Accommodation System. Students with caring responsibilities can use the ‘personal circumstances’ part of the booking form to let us know that you're a carer and if you have any accommodation requirements in relation to this. For more information on the booking process and our halls of residence, please check our Accommodation webpages.

If you are caring for a child who will be living with you during your studies, you might also be able to apply for dedicated family accommodation.

LSE’s Financial Support Office provides a range of financial support to students, pre-enrolment and during their time at LSE. The Financial Support Office host regular drop-in sessions that are a great starting point to find out more about what financial support is available to you and how you can apply for it.

Below are some examples of the types of funding that might be particularly relevant, if you have a caring responsibility:

-         LSE Undergraduate Bursary Scheme: If you apply for a means-tested loan via Student Finance England, they'll share your information with LSE. Bursaries are automatically awarded to any UK undergraduate student with a household income of up to £50,000. Find out more on our LSE Bursaries webpage.

-          LSE's Discretionary Bursaries are available to UK undergraduate students with exceptional financial need, including caring responsibilities. They are intended as a top up to the standard LSE Bursary, or can be awarded if a student’s household income falls outside of the sliding scales. If you are already entitled to the maximum value LSE Bursary of £4,000 we are unable to award an LSE Discretionary Bursary. Further information can be found on the LSE Bursaries webpage. 

-          LSE’s In-Course Financial Support provides further financial support to registered students. This funding includes the LSE Access Fund, which is available to some groups of students who require assistance with general living costs, including those with caring responsibilities, and the Student Support Fund, which supports students at all levels of study facing unforeseen financial hardship.

The Disability and Wellbeing service (DWS) offers confidential advice and support to all disabled students. This includes support for students with physical impairments, long-term health conditions, mental health conditions, specific learning difficulties, and autistic spectrum conditions. 

DWS also has a team of Mental Health Advisers who can provide advice and support to students whose mental health condition is impacting or may impact on your studies. The Mental Health Advisers can offer practical support around managing your studies while coping with a mental health condition, as well as helping with support if you are having a serious crisis or need urgent help.

LSE also has a Wellbeing Service for any student who would like to discuss support for their mental health and wellbeing. The Wellbeing Advisers will help you to explore the support that would be most helpful to you, including workshops & groups, self-care strategies, peer support, support from a Disability or Mental Health Adviser, referral to the LSE Counselling Service and signposting to LSE and external resources.

LSE also has a Counselling Service that offers a private and confidential space for students to talk with a trained professional about anything in your life which is impacting on your psychological wellbeing and daily life, counsellors don’t provide advice or solutions but work with you to reflect on whatever you are finding difficult and help to identify healthier strategies to manage this.

The LSE Faith Centre hosts a wide range of religious and wellbeing activities for all LSE students and is working to create a fully faith-inclusive campus. The centre offers a range of wellbeing services such as Ashtanga Yoga, Tai Chi and Meditation, alongside quiet spaces for reflection.

The LSESU Level Up Fitness space offers a wide range of fantastic gym facilities with great value memberships for students, including the use of a range of resistance machines, cardio equipment and a new functional area with spin bikes.

We provide a range of academic support to students during their time at LSE, both on a departmental level and School-wide.

Within the departments, your central point of contact is your Academic Mentor. They can give you academic guidance and feedback, but also guidance on non-academic issues.

Some departments also have Departmental Senior Student Advisers who can help you to navigate (alongside your Academic Mentor) the advice and support services available to you, and will assist you with your wellbeing needs. 

If you are an undergraduate student, you can also reach out to your Departmental Tutors who act as an alternative point of contact and can assist with more complex queries. For postgraduate students, the Programme Directors can assist you with further support.

Outside of the department, the LSE LIFE team offers a range of academic support, including one-to-one support and group workshops. Further help is offered by the Academic Support Librarians,  and the Digital Skills Lab.

LSE’s Students’ Union (LSESU) provides free advice and support to all LSE students as part of its Advice Service. The LSESU can advise you on a range of academic and housing issues. As LSESU is independent from LSE, they are able to offer impartial advice. They can also help you to get your voice heard and advocate for issues you think the university needs to address.

LSESU also administers its own range of financial support in the form of the Hardship Fund. The hardship fund is a means-tested fund designed to help students who have fallen into short-term, unforeseen hardship and it could contribute towards childcare costs, emergency housing or medical costs, for example.

Outside of LSE the Carers Trust is a good source of information, advice, guidance and advocacy.

UCAS also provides information and advice for prospective and current undergraduate students who are parents or have caring responsibilities.