Doctoral degree programmes (PhD)

Admission and funding

Admission and funding

  1. Admission requirements

    To be admitted to a PhD programme, you must have funding and have achieved a good grade on your master’s degree.

    Major emphasis is also placed on the quality of the project description, the plan for conducting the project, the project’s relevance to the field of the PhD programme in question, and that the project can be conducted within a net framework of three years.

    You can contact the PhD programme you are applying to for more information about what a project description should contain.

    Funding

    Before you can be admitted to an organised doctoral degree programme, you must have been granted funding. PhD candidates do not have student status in Norway and are therefore not entitled to funding from the Norwegian State Educational Loan Fund (Lånekassen).

    Most PhD candidates at OsloMet are employed as research fellows in temporary positions. You can find vacancies for research fellow positions at OsloMet here. You can also enter into a funding agreement with an employer other than OsloMet.

    The Research Council of Norway provides funding to enterprises in the public sector (public sector PhD) and private sector (industrial PhD), where an employee wishes to take a PhD. Through this scheme, businesses can apply for funding equivalent to up to 50% of the applicable research fellow rate, for an employee who wants to take a PhD. Contact the person with administrative responsibility for the relevant PhD programme if you and your employer wish to enter into a collaboration of this kind for an industrial or public sector PhD.

    Master’s degrees

    The master’s degree that forms the basis for admission to a PhD programme at OsloMet must normally be a two-year programme (minimum 120 credits) and you must have been awarded a good grade for the degree. See the individual PhD programmes for more specific admission requirements.

    If you have taken your education abroad, we recommend contacting the Norwegian Agency for Quality Assurance in Education (NOKUT) to have the degree approved. Unfortunately, it can often take some time to have foreign education approved by NOKUT. If you have not received an answer before sending the application, please enclose documentation of your foreign education.

  2. The application process

    Appointment as a research fellow and admission to the PhD programme are two separate application processes. In order to apply for admission to a PhD programme at OsloMet, you must be appointed to a research fellow position or be funded in another way that can be documented.

    You must apply for admission using a separate application form. The whole form must be completed and it is also important that you enclose any documents requested in the application form. Incomplete applications will not be considered.

    Decisions on admission are made by the faculty/centre’s doctoral committee and are based on an overall assessment of the application and the relevance of the PhD project to the PhD programme you have applied for.

    When you have been admitted to a PhD programme and the start-up date has been decided, your employment as a research fellow will start.

  3. The structure of the programme

    The PhD programmes have a nominal length of three years of full-time study (180 credits). The programmes comprise a training component (courses) worth 30–35 credits, while the main component consists of independent research work carried out in active cooperation with a supervisor and other researchers (the doctoral thesis).

    The PhD courses, alongside work on the thesis, will provide the necessary academic specialisation and breadth.

Useful links

Useful links