Financial helps you receive as a French student

 

Financial helps you receive as a French student 

Hi ! 

Are you thinking to apply for a university in France ? Do you want to make sure that your financial situation is in coherence with your plans ? Then, this blog is made for you. It's written by a french student (with different nationality background). 

Each of the help mentioned below comes with certain conditions, which I will discuss as well. 

1) Student residencies 

Residence CROUS as called in french, are students accommodations which are mostly run by french government. It comes in attractive prices. Anyhow in some places, you can find a private apartment for the same price. 

For the price : one example, I stayed in one CROUS residence 18 square meter for 365 euros. This place was furnished with bed, refrigerator, desk and cupboards. It includes WC, bathroom, and a mini cuisine. If you select one with less square meter ( it comes with common sanitary rooms and kitchen), the price will be even less. 

In terms of comfort, it depends. Newly constructed or renovated buildings are tend to be more confortable than the old ones. I stayed in two CROUS residence. The second one was so much more confortable with a wonderful mountain view. Look for the comments in google for example for the specific residence that you would like to go. 

                                                            Residence with wonderful view

To have information about the different residence click here. 

To apply for a residence click here. This is a common link which also permits to search for students jobs, demand for CROUS financial aid called as BOURSE (3). 

2) CAF housing aid

In France if people's salary is under a certain threshold, they are eligible to ask for a housing aid. If you are a student staying alone, you can have for example 200 euros as housing aid. If you already have an income this help might vary. 

This financial support is given by CAF - caisse d'allocation familiale :  https://www.caf.fr

Your landlord will have to fill an application. Be careful. Not all accommodations are eligible for housing help ("aide au logement" in french). If you have a CROUS residence they will give you a certificate the day you will take the keys. You will have to give this paper to CAF. 

3) Financial aid - Bourse sur critère sociaux (as said in french)

Students whose parents have limited salary can apply for this help, but it demands certain conditions. Your parents should be working in France, or have french nationality. It's mostly not for students who come to France just for studies. If you are eligible, the application is done online. You will be placed in one grade. Each grade offers a certain amount par month for 10 months. 

The highest is around 500 euros /month. 

For application you follow the same link to apply for CROUS residencies :  click here. 

Follow my blogs to see how to apply for this Bourse. 

4) CROUS university restaurants 

This is also run by CROUS. You can have a salad, meal, dessert and water for an affordable price. Recently, after COVID, french government has granted one meal for 1 euro par student. All you need to do is to charge your student card with some money. 

5) Assistance sociale 

Once you are here in France, you can take personal appointment if you are having any particular difficulties. This system depends on each university, the city etc. In case you are already here and need help, please ask for help. 

6) special discount on cinema and museums

Your student card also permits you to have reduction on movies, museums and some festivals etc. 

7) Transportation aid 

This depends on the city. Some cities have special discount for students, for transportation subscriptions. It can be more beneficial in certain city than others. If you have Bourse, then you can also have extra reductions. This In Strasbourg ( a city in northern France) with bourse you can have one month transportation (bus + tram) for 3€50cents. Whereas, in, Nancy (a city close to Strasbourg) even with bourse, transportation fee is around 17€ par month. 

8) Students exchange program - ERASMUS

Once you are here in France, if you are interested in moving to a different country for studies, there are student exchange programs. The interesting part in this is that, if you want to move to England for example, in this exchange program it will be free. Whereas normally you will need to pay for university. 

If you have any questions, if you want to discuss in detail about any of these topics, feel free to contact me. I know the pressures and questions that runs in us before moving to a new place (city or country) for education. I will be more than happy if I can be helpful, even a little bit. Please let me know if you would like to have one complete article about any of these points from this blog.

Be brave enough to dream ! Have a nice day. See you soon in an another blog.