Each year QS offers an exclusive scholarship for women in finance, in partnership with the Netherlands’ Duisenberg School of Finance. The scholarship covers €10,000 towards course fees for an EU winner, or €20,000 for a recipient from outside the EU, for a female candidate accepted onto one of Duisenberg’s master’s programs.
This year’s recipient of the QS-Duisenberg Scholarship for Women in Finance is Indian student Sanchi Maheshwari, who has just completed her undergraduate law studies at the University of Mumbai, and is preparing to start the LLM Finance and Law program at Duisenberg.
Sanchi first encountered Duisenberg when she attended the QS World Grad School Tour in Mumbai in November 2012, she recalls. “I interacted with a few representatives of the college and found them really good. That’s when I started looking for avenues where I could find some financial aid. I was looking at the website, saw the scholarship and decided to apply.”
Supporting female leaders
The aim behind this scholarship is not just to get more women working in finance, but to create more female leaders within the sector, explains Rick Rudolph, head of marketing and recruitment at Duisenberg. “The lack of women at top level has been a big issue in recent years, and there’s been lots of research into this area,” he says.
Sanchi recalls that at the time she applied for the Scholarship for Women in Finance – and wrote that winning application essay – she’d been feeling inspired by recent developments in India. “In the last few years, major transformations were taking place in the banking sector, with more women being appointed as the CEOs of banks and financial companies,” she recalls. “I was really motivated when I read about these female leaders, their stories, how they got to the top, how they saw themselves and their plans.”
Benefits of international exposure
In terms of her own story, Sanchi says she’s really keen to benefit from the “international exposure” she’ll gain from spending time studying outside her own country. She’s also looking forward to “being taught by world-class faculty, making friends from around the world, living in Amsterdam – just experiencing a different lifestyle. And going through the strenuous course – I’ve heard it’s very rigorous. I’m up for the challenge.”
After completing the LLM program, Sanchi would like to spend more time working abroad. “Doing a course is one thing, but getting to work in an international environment is totally different,” she believes. In terms of specializing, she’s still open to different possibilities, based on which aspects of the course she engages most with. The main thing, she says, is to be ready to take up any good opportunities that arise – and she is definitely ready!
