Émile Boutmy Scholarship at Sciences Po: Tuition Support for Non-EU Students

Émile Boutmy Scholarship at Sciences Po: Tuition Support for Non-EU Students

The Émile Boutmy Scholarship is a Sciences Po award for strong international applicants from outside the European Union. It is named after Émile Boutmy, the founder of Sciences Po, and is intended for students arriving at the institution for the first time. The award reduces tuition rather than sending a separate living-cost payment. It can make a major difference to the cost of studying in France, but it does not by itself create a complete student budget.

This page is a historical reference for the 2026 admission cycle. Sciences Po’s admissions homepage says that admissions for the 2026 intake are closed and that the campaign for the 2027 intake opens at the end of September. The scholarship page has not yet published a new 2027 deadline. No new date should be inferred from the old calendar. The verified 2026 deadlines and rules below are useful for understanding the programme and preparing for the next announcement, but they are not an open application invitation.

Key details

The official page does not describe the Boutmy award as a monthly stipend. Its published amounts are tuition exemptions. A recipient therefore needs a separate plan for housing, food, transport, insurance, residence-permit costs where applicable, and other living expenses.

What the award covered in the verified cycle

For a bachelor’s student, the 2026-cycle award was either a total exemption from tuition fees or an exemption of €9,500 from tuition fees. Sciences Po says that the scholarship is awarded to students arriving for their first year of study. For students who already hold the award, the amount is determined at admission and may be adjusted in line with tuition-fee increases. A recipient who does not validate the academic year loses the scholarship, and a recipient who defers admission also loses it.

The official page adds two programme-specific details for bachelor’s students. During the third-year year abroad, recipients retain their tuition-fee grant. The scholarship is tied to the programme of study at the time of admission. If a student later enrols directly in a dual-degree programme in the third year, the page says that the Boutmy benefit is lost. The award is automatically renewed when an undergraduate scholarship holder continues to graduate studies at Sciences Po in an eligible programme.

For a master’s student, the published amount is a €18,500 exemption from tuition fees for each of the two years of the Master’s programme. It is awarded to students arriving for their first year. Sciences Po says that the amount for holders already at the institution is determined at admission and may be recalculated annually if tuition fees rise. As at bachelor’s level, failing to validate the academic year or deferring admission causes the scholarship to be lost.

These are fee exemptions, not guaranteed cash awards. The actual financial value depends on the tuition arrangement that applies to the programme and the student’s circumstances. Applicants should read the programme’s own tuition information alongside the scholarship page before building a budget.

Eligibility

The core eligibility test has four parts. You must be a first-time applicant to Sciences Po, come from a non-European Union state, belong to a household that does not file taxes within the European Union, and be admitted to the Undergraduate or Master’s programme. Admission to an eligible programme is essential: the scholarship request is only considered if Sciences Po admits the candidate to one of its eligible programmes.

Sciences Po describes the selection criterion as merit and the profile sought for the programme. That wording matters. The current official page does not frame Boutmy as a general grant awarded solely because a household demonstrates financial need. The tax-residence rule is part of eligibility, but it should not be rewritten as a promise that a financial-need assessment will produce an award. Admission remains the gateway, and the award is competitive.

The published exclusions are detailed:

• Swiss and Norwegian applicants are excluded because they may be entitled to CROUS scholarships.
• Applicants with dual citizenship, where one citizenship is from the European Union, are excluded.
• Applicants from Quebec cannot apply at master’s level because they may benefit from the same sliding-scale fees as European applicants; Quebec applicants for a bachelor’s degree are eligible.
• Candidates for the Joint Master’s in Journalism and International Affairs and for the Master’s in Journalism are excluded.
• Master’s-level dual-degree candidates are excluded except for the dual degree in Journalism Sciences Po/Columbia University, the Sciences Po/Fudan University dual degree with the Europe-Asia in Global Affairs concentration for applicants with Chinese nationality, and the Sciences Po/Peking University dual degree for applicants with Chinese nationality.
• PhD thesis candidates, candidates for one-year Master’s programmes, most bachelor’s dual-degree candidates, and candidates applying through the French graduate admission procedure are excluded. The official page says a bachelor’s dual-degree exception may exist under a specific agreement.

The page’s eligibility list also says exchange students are not eligible. Its FAQ separately says that an exchange student may apply if the situation matches the eligibility criteria. That is an unresolved inconsistency inside the official page, so an exchange applicant should obtain a written answer from Sciences Po’s Admissions Department before treating the scholarship as available. This archive does not turn that conflict into a definitive promise.

Tax residence is not the same thing as the applicant’s current physical location. The official FAQ says Sciences Po considers the parents’ tax residence rather than simply the student’s location, unless the student qualifies as financially independent. A student living in an EU country may therefore still need to establish the relevant non-EU household or independent status. Anyone with a complex family, citizenship, or independence situation should confirm it directly with Admissions.

How the application worked

There is no universal stand-alone Boutmy application for an applicant using the normal Sciences Po online admissions platform. The scholarship request is made as part of the admission application, not after admission. Applicants from foreign secondary schools applying to the Undergraduate College had to indicate that they were applying for the Émile Boutmy Scholarship in the “Financial information” section of the Sciences Po application.

Applicants from French secondary schools followed a different route. After their application had been validated on Parcoursup, they had to contact the Admission Office by completing the online form linked from the official scholarship page. This is why the simple statement “there is no separate form” is incomplete: there is no separate scholarship application for the normal online route, but the Parcoursup route uses an Admission Office form to signal the request.

First-time master’s applicants had to indicate their Boutmy request in the “Financial information” section of their Sciences Po application. They also had to attach a language test when applicable. The language requirement is programme-dependent, so a candidate should follow the current master’s application instructions and not assume that every master’s applicant needs the same test.

Sciences Po also describes a special route for candidates currently in deferral. A deferring Undergraduate College or Master’s candidate may apply through the contact form before the deadline if they either did not request the scholarship in the original application or requested and received it in the previous year but lost it because of the deferral. The contact submission must include a CV and the information requested by Sciences Po: the country of tax residence, an optional second tax-residence country, total household income in euros from the year before last, the number of financially dependent children including the applicant, and whether siblings are pursuing higher education.

The page says that only complete files are considered and that no request is accepted after the deadline. It also says that a candidate refused the scholarship cannot apply again within the same admission process. A student cannot wait for an admission decision and then add Boutmy afterward: it is not possible to apply after admission or during studies. The Admissions Department awards the scholarships, and only admitted candidates in eligible programmes have their requests considered.

Verified 2026 deadlines and archive status

The scholarship page lists these deadlines for the closed cycle:

• Undergraduate applicants from foreign secondary schools: January 20, 2026, with results before mid-May.
• Undergraduate applicants from French secondary schools: April 1, 2026.
• Master’s applicants: October 19 for the first committee, with results before December 30, or November 30 for the second committee, with results before March 2.

The official scholarship page does not print a year beside the two master’s committee dates. The admissions homepage separately states that the 2026 intake is closed and that the 2027 campaign opens at the end of September. Sciences Po has not published a new scholarship deadline on the verified page, so this entry does not convert October 19 or November 30 into an invented 2027 date.

The front matter uses deadline = "2026-04-01" because it is the latest explicitly dated deadline displayed for the verified 2026 cycle. historicalReference = true tells the site that this date belongs to a closed round. It should not be read as a live date for submitting an application today. When Sciences Po publishes the next cycle’s actual deadline, this page can be refreshed again with that date and the corresponding admission instructions.

Materials and preparation

The first requirement is a complete application for an eligible Sciences Po programme. Prepare the academic records, personal or motivation materials, references, tests, and identity documents required by that programme. The Boutmy page does not publish one universal financial-document checklist for every applicant. Do not claim that a standard household tax packet is always required unless the next official cycle says so.

For the standard online route, make the scholarship request in the “Financial information” section while the admission application is open. For a French-secondary-school bachelor’s route, wait until the Parcoursup application has been validated and then use the Admission Office form. For a master’s application, check whether a language test applies and attach it by the scholarship deadline. For a deferral case, prepare the CV and the household and tax-residence information listed by Sciences Po before contacting the Admissions Department.

Start with the programme deadline rather than a generic scholarship calendar. The award is embedded in admission, and different applicant routes can close at different times. Keep a copy of the submitted scholarship request and all confirmation messages. If the admission portal does not clearly show that the request was recorded, ask Admissions before the deadline rather than assuming it will be added later.

Build the budget separately from the award. Even the higher master’s exemption does not automatically pay for rent, food, travel, visa or residence costs, health-related expenses, or personal equipment. Look for external funding early. Sciences Po says Boutmy may be combined with external scholarships such as Eiffel, AEFE, and French government scholarships, but it may not be combined with another scholarship awarded by Sciences Po and its partners, including the partners named on the official page.

Questions applicants often ask

Can I apply only for Boutmy without applying to Sciences Po? No. You must apply to an eligible bachelor’s or master’s programme and be admitted before Sciences Po considers the scholarship request.

Can I apply after admission or once I am enrolled? No. The official page says students cannot apply after admission or during their studies. Deferral candidates have the special contact-form route described above, subject to the listed conditions and deadline.

Is the award a living stipend? No. The published benefit is a tuition-fee exemption. Plan separately for living costs.

Can an EU dual national apply? The published eligibility list excludes candidates with dual citizenship where one citizenship is from the European Union.

Can I combine Boutmy with another award? Sciences Po says it may be combined with external scholarships, but not with scholarships awarded by Sciences Po and its partners.

What should I do now that the 2026 cycle is closed? Use this page to understand the programme, monitor the official Sciences Po scholarship and admissions pages for the 2027 campaign, and wait for the next published deadline. Do not submit an old-cycle request or treat the archived 2026 date as open.

Official links

• Émile Boutmy Scholarship: https://www.sciencespo.fr/students/en/fees-funding/bursaries-financial-aid/emile-boutmy-scholarship/
• Sciences Po Admissions: https://www.sciencespo.fr/admissions/en/
• Sciences Po: https://www.sciencespo.fr/en/

Sciences Po is the organisation behind the verified scholarship page and the admissions calendar. This entry keeps the 2026 facts as a historical reference until the institution publishes the next cycle’s official amount, eligibility wording, application route, and deadline.