Grants and Writing Resources for Queen's University Belfast

The 2025 Global Undergraduate Awards named a third-year Queen's architecture student a Regional Winner in Architecture and Design for a community observatory and research centre on Rathlin Island. The design uses straw, thatch and timber so the building can decay back into the landscape, since the site may flood in about 75 years.

Student Journals and Magazines

The School of Social Sciences, Education and Social Work publishes the Social Sciences Student Journal in two strands, one for undergraduates and one for taught postgraduates, covering criminology, sociology, social policy, education and social work. A PhD student in Education is the student editor for both.

Creative writers have the Queen's Writers' Society, open to students in any degree. Its workshop groups in poetry, prose, film and script, and translation meet every two weeks, and its student-led literary magazine, The Apiary, comes out twice a year, with launch events where writers read their work.

Help With Writing

Undergraduates book one-to-one appointments with the Learning Development Service, online or in person at One Elmwood, for help with academic writing, referencing, critical thinking and preparing for a coming assessment. Postgraduates are pointed to the Thomas J. Moran Graduate School instead. Its Academic Essentials programme offers one-to-one consultations with feedback on a piece of writing, workshops that prepare doctoral students for Differentiation, the Annual Progress Review and the viva, and writing retreats through the year that use free writing and the Pomodoro method. Students whose first language isn't English are referred to the Academic English Service.

Presenting and Funding Research

PhD and professional doctorate candidates who have passed confirmation can enter the Queen's 3 Minute Thesis Competition, which pays £200, £150 and £100 to the top three at its grand final, each with an engraved trophy. The winner goes on to the UK Vitae 3MT final.

Research students who are Queen's graduates, or children of graduates, could apply to the Alumni Postgraduate Research Awards, funded with the Bank of Ireland. In 2024-25 the scheme offered five awards of up to £1,000 toward fees, living costs, travel or training. Doctoral students on collaborative PhDs co-created with an outside partner join the Sir Peter Gregson Doctoral Programme for workshops and networking events.

Where Theses Are Published

Every research student deposits an electronic thesis in Pure, and it appears open access on the Queen's Research Portal unless an embargo applies (Queen's E-Thesis guide). Students can't graduate until it's in.

Our editors work with Queen's writers at the final-draft stage, from seminar papers to dissertations. See our Queen's University Belfast dissertation and thesis editing and Queen's University Belfast essay editing pages, or write to editors@editorsforstudents.com.

From Our Writing Guides

• Dissertation Defense: Defending the Logical Skeleton
• Writing the Abstract and Title: First Impressions Matter
• The "Ugly First Draft": Reducing Performance Anxiety