As a rule, every doctoral student without a doctoral degree who is enrolled in the doctoral school is eligible for a doctoral scholarship for a cumulative period not exceeding 4 years.
A doctoral scholarship is not available to a doctoral student whose education at a doctoral school requires employment at an entity running a doctoral school:
The minimum (gross) amount of the doctoral scholarship, funded by subsidies, is:
Higher doctoral scholarship is granted to doctoral students with a disability certificate and/or the certificate to in Article 5 and Article 62 of the Act of 27 August 1997 on professional and social rehabilitation and employment of disabled people. Such a person receives a doctoral scholarship in the amount increased by 30%.
The amount of the minimum basic salary for a professor at a public university specified in the regulation is
PLN 9.370,00.
The doctoral scholarship is not subject to income tax. Instead, doctoral students studying at doctoral schools and receiving a doctoral scholarship are covered by mandatory pension and accident insurance. Sickness insurance is voluntary.
Polish students
The university is required to register for health insurance those PhD students who are not otherwise covered. This official requirement arises on the day on which the doctoral student files a statement confirming that they are not subject to health insurance requirement arising from another source, yet not earlier than on the date of commencing the first semester of education. It expires upon completion of the course of doctoral studies or disenrollment.
Any change in the eligibility for insurance, such as acquiring/losing sickness pension entitlement, undertaking employment under an employment contract or a civil-law service contract [umowa zlecenie] and/or loss of insurance eligibility as a family member upon reaching the age of 26, requires the immediate submission of the aforementioned statement. Registration for health insurance in connection with circumstances other than the PhD student status will automatically result in the loss of health benefits based on this eligibility criterion.
Should the PhD student be deregistered from health insurance based on circumstances other than the PhD student status, they will automatically lose their entitlement to health benefits.
Eligibility for health benefits does not automatically arise from being a PhD student; the University will make a registration for the insurance only on the basis of the statement submitted by the student.
Registration for health insurance by the University does not reduce the amount of the doctoral scholarship.
On graduation from the Doctoral School, student’s eligibility for health care benefits will expire after 4 months of the date of graduation or disenrollment.
Non-EU or EFTA PhD Students
If you are a PhD student from outside the European Union or from a country that is not European Free Trade Association (EFTA) member state, studying in Poland without being entitled to health insurance from another source, you may request for insurance cover on a voluntary basis. To do so, without any involvement on the part of the Doctoral School, you should:
Doctoral scholarship, regardless of the student's place of origin, is subject to deductions for mandatory old age pension and disability insurance. Social insurance contributions for PhD students are calculated based on the gross amount of the doctoral scholarship.
The old age pension contribution is financed in equal parts by the student and the University (9.76% each). The disability pension contribution is covered by the student in the amount of 1.5% of the reference amount [podstawa składki] while the University covers 6.5% of the reference amount. The accident insurance contribution is fully covered by the University.
PhD students may apply for voluntary sickness insurance. The sickness insurance contribution is calculated as 2.45% of the gross amount of the doctoral scholarship and is financed by the student. To enroll in this insurance, the student must submit the required statement.
During the suspension of education, to determine the amount of doctoral scholarship, the provisions regarding the determination of maternity allowance shall apply, however, the basis for the calculation of the allowance shall be the amount of the monthly doctoral scholarship that is available on the day of submission of the application for suspension.
PhD students may apply to their university units for the award of an increased doctoral scholarship funded by subsidies by 5th October 2023.
An increased doctoral scholarship may be granted to a PhD student in the first year of doctoral studies subject to all the following conditions being jointly satisfied:
1) the student’s average grade for the second degree (second-cycle) programme or uniform Master’s programme is above 4.75,
2) during the admission procedure to the doctoral school, the student qualified as one of the top 30% of candidates admitted to the first year of studies. In cases where the top 30% is not a whole number, it will be rounded down to the nearest whole number.