Scholarships, awards and prizes

The Royal College of Ophthalmologists offers a range of scholarships, awards and prizes every year to undergraduates, researchers and clinicians. Interested? Find out more here.

Each year, we offer a generous number of scholarships, travel awards and clinical/research fellowships in partnership with other organisations. These cover a wide variety of areas, from specialist research, to help with funding electives for undergraduates.

An award grant is a great way to enhance continued professional development and contribute to research, service development and audit for the benefit of eye care services in the UK.

Awards are added through out the year. Please watch out for announcements in EyeMail and on College social media platforms.  Direct any travel awards and scholarship enquiries to [email protected].

We ask all our reward recipients to submit a written report within three months of completing their fellowship/research, using this report format guidance. The report is circulated to the Education Committee and the awarding body.

Please note: the Patrick Trevor-Roper Undergraduate Travel Award has come to an end. There is no replacement undergraduate travel award planned at this stage. If this changes, there will be an announcement via the usual channels: EyeMail, College social media platforms, and on this page.

Open Awards

The 2024 Sir William Lister and Dorey Bequest Travel Awards are now open for submissions.

The award is for ophthalmologists in training who are citizens of the United Kingdom as well as Members and Fellows of the Royal College of Ophthalmologists, in good standing.

The number and value of the awards will be determined by the state of the funds and the candidate’s requirements; the amount awarded is generally between £300 and £600, up to a maximum of £1000.

Those who have received a travel award from the Ethicon Foundation Fund are not eligible to apply.

The closing date for entries is 9am Monday 28 October 2024. The application form and full details can be found here.

Application forms and queries should be sent to [email protected]

The 2024 Chandra Award is now open for submissions.

The aim of the award is to allow doctors from outside the U.K. to come to the U.K. for training or a period of clinical observation. They would need to have already secured a training or observer post to be able to apply for this award.

The 2023 Chandra Award winner was Dr Prachi of the Department of Ophthalmology, King George Medical University, Lucknow, India. Dr Prachi was kindly hosted by Southend University Hospital under Mr. Vernon Geh.

Funding has been generously donated by Girish Chandra who has offered the sum of up to £1,000 annually for this award. The Royal College of Ophthalmologists undertakes the administration for this award.

The application form can be found here.

The closing date is 2 December 2024. Applications and queries should be submitted to [email protected]

Awards & Prizes Reports

Read the reports from previous successful applicants and hear what they achieved with their awards and prizes.

Read more