If you think you may qualify for a £500 annual bursary from the Irish Ex-Service Trust, you'd better hurry. The closing date for applications is next Monday. The bursaries are offered on a means-tested basis to third-level students who are either ex-British services personnel or their children. Although the ex-serviceperson must be resident in the island of Ireland, bursaries may be offered for courses undertaken abroad. To qualify, students must be following approved third-level programmes; while the bursaries are available for the duration of a course (up to four years), students may apply mid-course. They are not available for post-grad programmes. Forty bursaries are on offer for this academic year; of these, 19 have already been allocated as renewals. According to Major Hume Grogan, British Legion administrator in Dublin, the bursaries, which were offered for the first time four years ago, are funded by interest accrued on cash raised by the sale of the Soldiers and Sailors Land Trust houses, the last of which were sold in the Republic only a few years ago.

Contact the British Legion, 26 South Frederick Street, Dublin 2 (tel: (01) 671 3044).