The Rhodes Trust announced earlier this month that the Rhodes Scholarship’s Global Constituency will be suspended for the 2026-2027 application cycle.
The Rhodes Scholarship, established in 1902, is a “fully-funded postgraduate award which enables talented young people from around the world to study full-time at the University of Oxford”. The merit-based program offers scholarships for graduate study to around 100 scholars yearly. The scholarships cover all tuition fees, a living expense stipend, and round-trip travel to Oxford, where the Rhodes House is located.
Established geographical constituencies for the scholarship include the United States of America, Canada, Southern Africa, and India. There is a defined number of scholarships to be awarded in each area, with 32 Rhodes Scholars selected from the United States each year, making it the largest constituency. However, several world regions do not have constituencies, including South and Central America, North Africa and most European nations, with these areas instead covered by the “Global Constituency”, which has two scholarships every year since 2018.
On its website, the Rhodes Trust specified that the suspension of the Global Constituency scholarships was due to the organisation’s shifting “strategic priorities”.
Asked for more details on their changing priorities, a Rhodes Trust spokesperson told Cherwell: “As the Rhodes Trust looks ahead, the Board of Trustees has undertaken a careful review of how best to fulfil its charitable mission and deliver the unique Scholar experience that defines a Rhodes Scholarship. Following this, the Board has decided to focus the Trust’s Scholarship provision within its established constituency network, and will not be awarding Global Scholarships going forward, including in the current cycle.”
Candidates who are ineligible in an established Rhodes constituency may also have the option to apply for Inter-Jurisdictional Consideration for the scholarship, available if a candidate is “strongly connected to two or more Rhodes constituencies” but not eligible to apply in any one area.
In their initial announcement of the suspension, the Rhodes Trust acknowledged that “this will be disappointing to those hoping to apply to the Global Scholarship this year”.
