Santander Scholarships initiative seeks to assist university community during coronavirus lockdown. 

Announcements of various programmes available on www.becas-santander.com

Madrid, 2 April 2020.
Santander Universities is offering over 20,000 scholarships and grants worldwide for online courses to help alleviate the situation caused by the global coronavirus pandemic. This Santander Scholarships programme is aimed at helping undergraduates and graduates develop digital, language and soft skills which will help their future employability. It will also help university lecturers in an increasingly digital world.

The #StayAtHome programme seeks to offer undergraduates, graduates and university lecturers creative solutions so that during the current confinement they can identify their training needs and explore the best options available. The #StayAtHome scholarships and grants will be rolled out gradually over the coming weeks.

The Santander Scholarships #StayAtHome programme is aimed at improving people's digital skills. For this purpose an agreement has been signed with the Fundación del Instituto de Empresa, a leading global business school. Over 15,000 scholarships and grants will be made available to students and lecturers to promote digital and leadership skills as well as offering online courses to assist them in their academic activities in an increasingly digital world. 

Language skills have also been identified as a priority during the current confinement. The #StayAtHome initiative includes an agreement with the British Council so that students can certify their level of English officially. 

Santander Scholarships will be publishing more announcements as part of the #StayAtHome programme over the coming weeks which will focus on soft skills.

Javier Roglá says "The coronavirus pandemic is forcing us to adapt to circumstances we've never experienced before. Therefore, Santander Universities wants to offer our undergraduates and graduates an extensive range of online courses so they can be better equipped in their professional lives post-covid-19. Now is the time to ramp up our commitment to the employability of university students and the new scholarships we're offering are the best way."

Banco Santander is able to offer these global scholarships and grants thanks to the collaboration agreements it has put in place with universities and institutions worldwide for over 20 years. 

Those interested can find out more information on the various scholarship programmes available and apply at www.becas-santander.com

The scholarship programmes backed by Banco Santander help people, businesses and society prosper: driving talent, supporting equal opportunities, inclusion, diversity and sustainable growth. They also aim to improve the training and skills of university students, in an increasingly digitalised and globalised environment which is constantly changing.

This work, which the bank has undertaken for the past 23 years together with 1,000 universities and academic institutions in 22 countries, led to the awarding of 68,671 Santander Scholarships last year, with an investment of EUR 119 million. Banco Santander is firmly committed to progress and inclusive, sustainable growth, with a long-standing dedication to higher education that sets it apart from the world's other financial institutions. 

With over EUR 1,800 million invested in academic initiatives since 2002 via Santander Universities and over 430,000 university scholarships and grants awarded since 2005, it has been recognised as the company that invests most in education in the world (Varkey / UNESCO / Fortune 500 report), with 1,000 agreements with universities and institutions in 22 countries.