Look through these FAQs. If these do not answer your question, read the detailed Arkwright Handbook. If this does not answer your question, phone Arkwright HQ for an answer.

Students should be 15/16 years old, and apply when they are in the year that they do all or the majority of their GCSEs or Scottish National 5s. In the vast majority of cases this is year 11 (England and Wales), S4 (Scotland) and year 12 (Northern Ireland).

Students who take some GCSEs/ Scottish National 5 qualifications in year 10 (England and Wales) / S3 (Scotland) / year 11 (Northern Ireland) and others in year 11/S4/12 should apply for their Arkwright Engineering Scholarship in year 11 (England and Wales), S4 (Scotland) and year 12 (Northern Ireland). Students who complete all their GCSEs/Scottish National 5 qualifications a year early should apply to Arkwright in that year.

The window for on-line student applications opens in early November and closes in mid-January each academic year (exact dates vary slightly each year).

Schools can submit as many students as they like, but we encourage schools to identify those students with the best chance of success (see our applicant criteria page). Typically, schools submit between 0 and 4 applicants per year. There is no obligation on schools to submit applicants every year and, conversely, if a school has an outstanding year group it will on occasion submit more the 4 applicants .

The fee is £45.00 for each student application and you can pay on the submission portal at the end of the application process.

Alternatively, invoices for all applications endorsed by the teacher are sent to the school for payment. Schools are free to ask parents to pay the fee. Full T&Cs are provided in the Arkwright Handbook.

Teachers can delete a student from the portal if he/she has not yet started his/her application. If a nominated student has started his/her application, teachers should simply not submit the student's application to Arkwright.

If a student's application has already been submitted to Arkwright by the teacher through the on-line application system, then the teacher must make Arkwright aware, by email by midnight on the application deadline date in January, of their wish to withdraw the student.

Any applicant who does not sit the Aptitude Exam, where the teacher or applicant has not given prior notice of withdrawal by midnight on the January closing date, will be charged the full fee of £45.00.

The Exam must be sat during the afternoon of the first Wednesday in February, in your school, under national exam conditions. Under no circumstances may the Exam be sat at home.

The Exam may not be sat prior to the advertised Exam date, nor may it be sat on the morning of the advertised Exam date. Special arrangements can be made for applicants who are attending a pre-arranged field trip or sitting a National Exam on the advertised Exam date. In such cases the Arkwright Aptitude Exam may be taken on the Thursday or Friday of the Exam week, but no later. Any change in the Exam date must have the prior permission of the Arkwright Chief Executive. Teachers should email the Arkwright Schools Coordinator with details. An acknowledgement will be sent to the teacher confirming the new agreed date.

Applicants who cannot sit the Exam within the timescales set out in the paragraph above cannot be considered for an Arkwright Engineering Scholarship.

The Aptitude Exam Papers are emailed to the School’s Examinations’ Officer, on the Monday before the exam is due to be sat, which is the first Wednesday in February.

Students have 10 minutes 'pen-down' reading time followed by 2 hours to complete the exam, unless there are any special circumstances / educational needs.

Arkwright strongly encourages applicants to practice the exam using the past papers available on our website.

Yes, Special Educational Needs (SENs) are taken into account for both the Aptitude Exam and the Interview (should the applicant reach the interview stage).

SENs must be notified at the time the teacher submits the student’s application in the on-line application portal.

An acknowledgement email will be sent to the Examinations’ Officer by close of day on the Tuesday, the day before the Aptitude Exam is sat. A copy of the acknowledgment should be attached by the Examinations’ Officer to the applicant’s exam script before it is posted to the designated Arkwright Marker.

Yes, this is all available on our Past-papers and Exemplars web page.

The Exam papers do not need to be returned to Arkwright. They can be retained by the school (stored securely for at least a week after the exam) and used to train future year's applicants, or they can be destroyed.

The students' exam scripts should be photocopied, this copy retained by the school, and the original scripts sent to the designated Arkwright Marker immediately after the Exam has been sat.

No, you should avoid any public discussion about the Aptitude Exam, e.g. by using on-line Social Media, because each year small numbers of applicants sit the exam a few days after the main date due to illness and other issues. Seeing details on social media could confer an unfair advantage on these students.

Arkwright reserves the right to withdraw from further consideration any student proven to have publically discussed the Exam to an extent that confers an unfair advantage on other applicants.

No. All applicants sit the Aptitude Exam. The Exam scripts and the applicant's initial on-line application are then graded. The scores of these two assessments are then combined to provide a ranking that enables the Arkwright Selection Panel to select the most promising applicants to go through to the interview stage.

No, the recommendations of the Interview panels are base purely on the potential of the applicant to be a future leader of the engineering profession.

No. Because we operate no quota system for student selection at the Interviews we have no idea how many students will pass selection each year. Similarly, we have no idea at the start of each year how many Scholarship will be pledged to be supported by the many current and new organisations that choose to support the Arkwright Engineering Scholarships.

The Scholarships last for the two year's of a student's A levels, Scottish Advanced Highers or International Baccalaureate, from 1^st September in year 1 to 31^st August in year 2.

However, the benefits of an Arkwright Engineering Scholarship last a lifetime!

The Arkwright Engineering Scholarships  has no Financial Endowment nor significant unrestricted Cash Reserves. It is a small charity that punches very much 'above its weight' due to the generosity of many and various donors. Every Scholarship that Arkwright awards must have a Sponsor to provide the necessary funding. Each year Arkwright must raise in the region of £800,000 to meet all of its needs.

As well as direct sponsorship of Scholars by specific organisations, Arkwright operates a Benefactors' Fund to collect and channel the smaller, or anonymous donations that it receives each year.