Funding

Every year, Trinity runs a fundraising campaign known as the Annual Campaign.

The priorities of each Annual Campaign reflect the needs of the college in that particular year and will align with the priorities set-out in the college’s five-year strategy.

The priorities for this year’s Annual Campaign (2023-24) are listed below.  We warmly encourage you to support the fund that matters most to you.  Alternatively, you can choose to allow the college to direct your gift to where it is needed most by leaving it unrestricted.

Graduate Support

Graduates are the academics, researchers, and industry-leaders of the future, and a key driving force behind the University’s ground-breaking research.  They make an enormous contribution to college life and to the college’s reputation for academic excellence.   The danger is that the debts they accumulate as undergraduates are such that no matter how brilliant or how dedicated to their subject they are, many simply cannot afford to take graduate courses.  This is a potential loss to the college, the University and ultimately the wider academic community.

Through the generosity of its benefactors, Trinity has funded a number of graduate scholarships in recent years and, as a result, is able to offer a range of full and partial funding to exceptional students from around the world.  The continuing support of benefactors remains essential if the college is to build upon the significant progress it has made and further extend the support it is able to offer graduate students.  In particular, we hope that they will consider supporting:

The Bryan-Ward Perkins Graduate Scholarship.  Set-up to mark Bryan’s retirement, the scholarship aims to raise £15,000 to cover the fees of a Masters student studying Late Antique and Medieval History. 

The Oxford-Sir Ivor Roberts Graduate Scholarship, named for the college’s former President, aims to support students of the humanities or social sciences.  In 2017-18, the college successfully secured matched funding from the University, which allowed the scholarship to fully fund every Home/EU DPhil recipient.  We hope to raise the final £20,000 that is needed for it to fully fund a graduate scholarship for a student from anywhere in the world. 

Support for Final-Year Clinical Medics

Trinity admits up to six pre-clinical students each year and until quite recently, many chose to go elsewhere for the second (clinical) part of their course. In response, we have invested in our provision for clinical students, including the appointment of a member of academic staff dedicated to supporting this group. Now, almost all clinical students prefer to stay at Trinity and we are keen to encourage this trend.

Medical students have living costs of around £18,600 p.a.  They can take out the standard student maintenance loan of £2,534 p.a., but in their final year, the maximum loan available falls to £1,975.  In addition, eligible students can also apply for an NHS grant of £1,000 and an NHS means-tested bursary of up to £4,491 p.a. Consequently, for the final year, even the best-funded receive no more than £7,466.

All medical students face a shortfall in funding in their final year.  Since for many, the college is their only source of additional support, it is vital that we are able to step-in and help them. Donations that would allow us to do so are gratefully received.  

Undergraduate Support

Trinity believes that no student with the potential to thrive at Oxford should be deterred from applying because of personal circumstances or finances.

The University has put in place one of the country’s most generous finance packages. These annual, non-repayable bursaries, which are offered to all qualifying students on admission, have lessened the pressure on Trinity to provide financial support to undergraduates.  However, students who don’t automatically qualify for university funding can face unexpected hardship as a result of a change in family or other circumstances.  College-based bursaries, therefore, remain essential, as do the donations that help to provide them.

Widening Access

Trinity is dedicated to demonstrating that Oxford is accessible to anyone with the potential to thrive here and the college's Access Team works hard to reach and welcome talented applicants from a wide range of backgrounds.

Trinity's active outreach programme helps to give pupils an insight into life and study at Oxford, to dispel negative myths about the University, and to equip teachers with the best possible advice and guidance for students wishing to apply to Oxford and other leading universities.  More information about outreach at Trinity, and its impact, can be found here and donations to support this work could not be more appreciated.

Maintaining and Enhancing the Fabric of Trinity

While its historic buildings make Trinity the attractive environment to which so many students are drawn, their listed status means they are costly to maintain.  In addition to the upkeep of the buildings and grounds, there is a continual need to improve study bedrooms, update IT facilities, replace books in the library, subscribe to essential online journals and ensure that the college is as energy efficient as possible.  It is a significant financial burden and donations are instrumental in allowing us to make such improvements on a regular basis.

Transforming the Herbaceous Border

The listed gardens are an integral part of Trinity’s historic estate and a key space for members of the college and the wider community.  The view from the Stuart Gates, of the lawns sweeping towards Garden Quad, is one of the most photographed in Oxford.  It is the college’s intention that the 120 m herbaceous border should once again become a showpiece of this iconic vista.

The design and planning of the border will be led by Chris Beardshaw, one of Britain’s most well-known and celebrated gardeners.  The work will be planned carefully in conjunction with the completion of the college’s Hall and kitchen project, since a temporary kitchen and dining hall are currently situated on the lawns close to Garden Quad.  Once the renovations are completed, the temporary structure will be removed, the lawns reinstated and the new border created.  

The Levine Building

The Levine Building provides state-of-the-art facilities for teaching and learning, residential accommodation and public outreach.   Opened officially in May 2022, it is transforming the experience of Trinity for the entire college community and the wider public.

Thanks to the tremendous generosity of Peter Levine and other benefactors, the target to raise £15 million (half the cost of the building) in donations has now been met.  The college is extremely grateful to everyone who has supported the campaign and, in doing so, has committed to making this transformational development possible.  As part of its commitment to raising the remaining £15 million, the college has taken a loan from its endowment.  Donations to the Levine Building continue, therefore, to be warmly received to help defray the cost to the college and release funds to be used for other projects.

Career Development Fellowship in Law

Oxford’s undergraduate law degree is structured in such a way that it means Trinity first years spend most of the year being taught outside College.

The sense of belonging that comes from being together as a group within College is important to students’ development, both academic and social, and we would very much like to be able to teach the first years ‘in house’ for more than one module in this formative year—especially, as this would allow the Law Fellows to monitor students’ progress more closely and to identify and step in swiftly to support anyone who is finding it difficult to make the transition from school to university. 

To achieve this, we are looking to fund a three-year appointment of a Career Development Fellowship (CDF) in Law at a cost of £33,000 p.a.  Not only would this enable more in-house teaching at Trinity but it would give a fledgling academic an opportunity to gain experience of teaching and research.

Earlier this year, we received a generous donation of £10,000 to launch the fundraising campaign and have since received a further pledge of £20,000.  Additional donations would be greatly appreciated and help create a post that would give a young academic a first step on the career ladder and greatly enhance the teaching provision for Trinity students. 

Fellowships

Safeguarding Tutorial Fellowships is essential if Trinity is to continue contributing to Oxford’s standing as a world-class teaching university.   At present, the college is facing both a reduction in traditional sources of funding for Fellowships and a significant increase in operating costs.  This increases the risk that as posts become vacant, they may be frozen or lost entirely due to a lack of funding.   

The support of benefactors has been instrumental in endowing posts in French, Law, Philosophy and Spanish, and to raising 90 per cent of what is needed to safeguard the college’s post in Classics, which continues to be a fundraising priority.  Trinity is working to endow as many of the remaining Fellowships as possible, at a cost of at least £2.5 million per post with Classics and History being a particular priority.

Research

A Fellowship carries the dual obligation of teaching and research. Oxford relies on the national research councils for large-scale grants and the level of this funding is determined by the output of academics across the collegiate university, including those at Trinity.

The college provides Fellows with a research allowance of £1,300 p.a.  However, it can be costly to undertake research, collaborate with academics in other institutions and present papers at conferences. The college welcomes donations which make it possible to increase research allowances, whether for individuals, specific subjects or more generally.