The Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs provides OKP (formerly known as NFP) and MSP scholarships for the RNTC courses for media and communications professionals from a variety of partner countries. The scholarships include a contribution towards the cost of living, course fees, visa, travel, and insurance. If applicable, the scholarship holder is expected to cover the difference between actual costs and the OKP or MSP scholarship amount. The scholarships are administered by Nuffic, the Netherlands Organisation for International Cooperation in Higher Education. 

Providing Full Facilities. 

Apart from the RNTC course admission requirements, you must meet the following requirements to be eligible for an OKP (formerly known as NFP) scholarship:

• You are a national and live and work in one of the countries in the Nuffic OKP list, which you can find here;
• You must not be employed by an organization that has its own means of staff-development. Organisations that are considered to have their own means for staff development are for example: multinational corporations (e.g. Shell, Unilever, Microsoft), large national and/or a large commercial organisations, bilateral donor organisations (e.g. USAID, DFID, Danida, Sida, Dutch Ministry of Foreign affairs, FinAid, AusAid, ADC, SwissAid), multilateral donor organisations, (e.g. a UN organisation, the World Bank, the IMF, Asian Development Bank, African Development Bank, IADB), international NGOs (e.g. Oxfam, Plan, Care);
• You have an Employer’s Statement that complies with the format Nuffic has provided. All information must be provided and all commitments that are included in the format must be endorsed in the statement;
• You have an official and valid passport;
• You do not receive more than one fellowship for courses that take place at the same time;
• Check if you need to provide a Government Statement here. If required, you must have a Government Statement that complies with the format Nuffic has provided. 

N.B. The OKP program has no age limit.

1. Register with RNTC to check that you are eligible for the course you would like to do. You can register for a course by selecting a course. Make clear in your registration that you are intending to apply for an OKP or MSP fellowship. Note that you can only apply for a scholarship for your chosen course during the scholarship application window for that course. There are two or three of these scholarship windows open every year.

2.    Once you have submitted your registration, RNTC will inform you by email whether you are eligible for a scholarship or not (usually within 10 working days).

3.    If you are eligible for the scholarship, RNTC will send you a link by email to apply for an OKP or MSP fellowship in the ATLAS online system. This is where you complete your scholarship application.

Please note that your OKP or MSP application has to be completed and submitted in one go via ATLAS! Once you have submitted your application, you will not be able to make changes or additions.

4.    Before applying for an OKP or MSP scholarship via ATLAS, make sure you have all the documents mentioned below ready. Please use the formats provided by Nuffic and submit all the required documents EXACTLY as specified. Otherwise, your application will be rejected by Nuffic! The file format should be PDF and your document must not exceed 2 MB.

• Copy of a valid passport. The passport needs to be still valid at least three months after the submission date of the registration form.
• A Letter of motivation. Has this prepared so you can copy/paste it into the online application form? This can be more or less the same motivation as you prepared for your RNTC application. This motivation will weigh heavily in the selection procedure. Make sure you address the following questions:
  • ​What is the issue or problem you want to address in your country?
  • How will this course enable you to address this issue?
  • How will you address this issue considering your position within your organization?

• An Employer’s Statement. This is a very important document, please fill it out EXACTLY as specified by Nuffic and use this format provided by Nuffic. PLEASE NOTE THAT THIS DOCUMENT CONSISTS OF TWO PAGES, BOTH HAVE TO BE FILLED IN, SIGNED & STAMPED.
• A Government Statement (if applicable for your country). A number of governments of OKP and MSP countries require a government statement before candidates can apply for a scholarship. In this statement, the government expresses its support for the scholarship application. Please check this overview to see if this applies to your country. Also, it’s always good to check this with your government and/or the Netherlands embassy. If a government statement is required for your country, please use this format provided by Nuffic for OKP countries and this format, if you are from an MSP country.

5.     Download and read the OKP and MSP registration instructions for ATLAS.

6.    If you are certain that you are eligible for an OKP or MSP scholarship and you have collected all the necessary information and documentation, you can start with your application in Nuffic’s ATLAS online application system using the online application form link that was sent to you.