Banach NAWA Scholarship: Funded Master's in Poland for Africans

What is the Banach NAWA Scholarship?

The Banach NAWA Scholarship Programme is Poland’s government scholarship for citizens of developing countries, paid from the Polish development aid budget, run by the National Agency for Academic Exchange (NAWA) and named after the mathematician Stefan Banach. It funds second-cycle (master’s) study only — not a bachelor’s degree and not a doctorate. Subject choice is open: there is no field restriction, and you pick from the programmes offered by the public universities that hold a framework agreement with NAWA You can study in Polish or in English, and the Polish path starts with a funded preparatory year. Poland is the only destination in our dataset that carries this scheme; our study in Poland guide covers tuition, visas and living costs for every applicant, funded or not. NAWA does not publish how many scholarships it gives out — the figure appears neither in the last call, nor on the results page, nor on the programme page.

What does it cover?

Tuition is waived in full at the host institution, which must be a public university supervised by the Minister of Science and Higher Education. NAWA then pays you PLN 2,500 per month directly. The funded period: Up to two years of second-cycle study, preceded on the Polish path by a one-year preparatory course; the scholarship is paid for a maximum of 12 months per academic year. Language support is included: A tuition-free NAWA preparatory course on the Polish-language path, or a Polish language and culture course on the English-language path. Travel is a one-off lump sum paid with your first monthly instalment, but the amount is not published anywhere we checked — the last call, the NAWA regulations for natural persons and the information-for-applicants page. The stipend is your whole budget for rent, food, insurance and books, and you cannot top it up with another award: No other scholarship for the same course of education during the agreement, except benefits under the EU Erasmus+ programme.

Who can apply from our countries?

Two of our nine origin countries are on the Banach list: Nigeria and Kenya. Ghana, Egypt, South Africa, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe and Morocco are not, and an application from those passports fails the formal check whatever an agent promises you. The rule itself is narrow: Citizens of the 36 Polish Aid partner countries named in the call, divided into four country groups with separate application caps. Polish citizens and anyone who has applied for Polish citizenship are excluded. Kenya sits in a group with Angola, Rwanda, Senegal, Tanzania and Tunisia, and that group shares one application cap; Nigeria sits in a different group with its own cap. Once a cap fills, the call closes early for everyone in that group.

On qualifications: A first-cycle (bachelor) degree awarded no earlier than 2024, or final-semester enrolment with graduation by 15 July of the application year. Holders of a second-cycle or uniform master degree are excluded. Language proof is not optional: Polish at B1 for the preparatory-course path, Polish at B2 for Polish-taught studies, English at B2 for English-taught studies, evidenced by a certificate from the recognised lists annexed to the call. No age limit and no work-experience requirement are published.

If your passport is not Nigerian or Kenyan, treat Banach as closed and spend your time on a scheme that lists your country — start from our scholarships for Nigerian students and scholarships for Kenyan students pages to see how the country filter works before you apply anywhere.

Deadline and timeline for 2027/28

The 2027/28 dates are not published. What is published is the last cycle, call 16/2026 for 2026/27; the 2027/28 call has not appeared yet. That call was announced on 13 April 2026, with no separate opening date, and closed on 8 May 2026 at a Warsaw-time cut-off on the closing day — or earlier, once a country group reached its application cap. Results were published by 31 July 2026, and successful students started in the winter semester. Plan the 2027/28 attempt backwards from a spring window: university admission and a language certificate have to exist before the call opens, because the application period is roughly one month long and can end sooner. Watch the NAWA programme page from January 2027.

How to apply for the Banach NAWA Scholarship

1. Check your citizenship against the country list in the current call, and note which group you are in and what that group’s application cap is. Nigeria and Kenya are listed; the other seven countries we work in are not.
2. Apply on your own to a public university that holds a framework agreement with NAWA. The eligible institutions are named in an attachment to the call. Admission comes first: NAWA funds a place you have already secured.
3. Get the language certificate your path needs, from the recognised lists annexed to the call. Book the test early; results and certified copies take weeks, and a letter from your school saying you studied in English is not accepted.
4. Record a self-presentation video in Polish or English, to the length the call specifies. Say what you want to study, why that programme, and what you will do with the degree at home.
5. Register in the NAWA IT system at programs.nawa.gov.pl and complete the application form for the programme.
6. Upload the documents: the passport page, your first-cycle diploma with supplement or a certificate of final-semester enrolment, the transcript of records, confirmation that you have applied to a Polish university, the language certificate, the video, and an optional letter of recommendation that the call scores.
7. Submit before the closing date — one application per person, and only the submitted one counts. Submit in the first days of the window, not the last, because the call can close early when your country group fills its cap.
8. Wait for the formal and substantive assessment, then the published results. There is no interview. If you are selected, you sign the agreement, enrol, and apply for the Polish national student visa.

Which universities and programmes

The binding list is the attachment to the current call: public universities supervised by the Minister of Science and Higher Education that hold a framework agreement with NAWA. Institutions in our dataset that promote Banach to international applicants include the University of Łódź, the University of Silesia, the University of Warsaw, Warsaw University of Technology and Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń. Warsaw University of Technology and Silesia both name Nigeria and Kenya in their own published country lists. The University of Wrocław entry in our dataset describes the sister Ignacy Łukasiewicz programme rather than Banach — that one is master’s study in engineering, technical, agricultural and natural sciences, on a different country list. Confirm your chosen university appears in the call attachment before you pay for translations; our Polish universities page lists the institutions we work with.

Odds, and what to do if you miss it

Nobody can quote you a success rate: the number of awards is not published, and neither is the number of applications received. The one hard signal is the group cap — the window can shut before the stated deadline, so timing is part of the competition. If you miss the cycle, or your country is not listed, the sister Ignacy Łukasiewicz programme runs on a different country list, and Stipendium Hungaricum in Hungary is open to more of our markets. Self-funded study in Poland is also cheaper than most of Western Europe; the Polish student visa requirements are the same either way, and a year of preparation usually produces a stronger file.