As of May 7, 2016 23:59 GMT/UTC, applications for the Erik Holst AM2016 GA Scholarship were closed.

The winner of the scholarship was Mr. Desire RUHINDA from Tanzania, who was selected among 52 applicants from all 5 IFMSA Regions to receive 500€ to cover part of his expenses to attend the 65th IFMSA GA  – August Meeting held in Puebla, Mexico.

Unfortunately, due to various reasons, Mr. Ruhinda had to cancel his participation to the AM2016 and did not travel to Puebla.
This led us to cancellation of his registration with the AM2016 Organizing Committee, however quite late after the GA had already started, which accordingly caused a significant loss of scholarship funds to the OC, for cancellation costs. It was then unanimously decided by the Erik Holst Fund Board of Directors that the AM2016 scholarship would be cancelled and the remaining funds would be transferred to the Fund’s savings account. After careful evaluation of the process followed, it was determined that the beneficiary was not responsible 100% for the late cancellation and subsequent loss of scholarship funds, therefore it was decided that he would be allowed to reapply for the MM2017 scholarship.

In terms of transparency, we would like to take this opportunity and provide you with full details on how the whole evaluation procedure took place:

The Fund first announced the call for applications for the scholarship on 24 April 2016 (over the IFMSA General server, Erik Holst Facebook page and erikholstfund.com) and provided a timespan of 2 weeks (14 days) for receiving applications online. The first announcement was also posted on various IFMSA-related Facebook groups, and was followed by 2 reminders as the deadline approached. The deadline for receiving applications expired on May 7th, 2016 at 23:59 (GMT/UTC). The application procedure was done at our website erikholstfund.com by filling in an online application form, which included a CV and a Motivation Letter of each applicant as a prerequisite for application submission. Through these two texts, we would be able to better become acquainted with each candidate and take a thorough look into their aspirations from their possible participation in the GA, their vision of IFMSA and themselves in it, as well as their background and achievements both academic, professional and personal. As the scholarship aims mainly in students who cannot attend the GA due to financial constraints, special attention was given to any relevant information provided by the applicant. Applicants that had not attended a GA before, or had applied before for our scholarship programme were also seen in a more favorable way.

After the 1st round of evaluation, a ranking list of all applicants was determined. Then, all applicants were arranged according to IFMSA Region and the 2 first of each Region were chosen, which provided us with a list of 12 finalists in total, because we encountered ties in some Regions. Then, a 2nd round of evaluation followed, starting with these 12 finalists, which led us to the final ranking list that gave the winner of the scholarship.

Finally, we would like to thank once again all those who applied, especially those who made it to the list of the 12 finalists! We do encourage all of the applicants to reapply next time, when the call for applications is released! We will be happy to receive your applications once again when time comes!

Check our website erikholstfund.com for more news & updates on the GA Scholarships and other upcoming grants, as we will be enriching its content soon and, as we shall be following our past grantees through their endeavors in IFMSA and other relevant experiences.

Kind regards,
Konstantinos M. Roditis
Chair, Prof. Erik Holst Fund Board of Directors

The Prof. Erik Holst Fund Board of Directors: Konstantinos Roditis (Chair), Yon Chong (Secretary), Stefan Buttigieg (External Relations Officer) and Xaviour Walker (Advisor).