Editing Trinity College Dublin (section)

===Awards===
====Entrance Exhibition and sizarship====
Students who enter with exceptional [[Leaving Certificate (Ireland)|Leaving Certificate]] or other public examination results are awarded an Entrance Exhibition. This entails a prize in the form of book tokens to the value of €150.00. Exhibitioners who are of limited means are made [[Sizar]]s, entitled to Commons (evening meal) free of charge.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.tcd.ie/calendar/assets/pdf/entrance-awards.pdf |title=Entrance Awards |access-date=April 13, 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081209152840/http://www.tcd.ie/calendar/assets/pdf/entrance-awards.pdf |archive-date= 9 December 2008}}</ref>

====Foundation Scholarship====
{{Main|List of Scholars of Trinity College Dublin}}
[[File:Announcement of Fellow and Scholars 2013.jpg|thumb|Announcement of Fellow and Scholars at Trinity College Dublin on Trinity Monday 2013]]
Undergraduate students of Senior Freshmen standing may elect to sit the Foundation Scholarship examination, which takes place in the Christmas Vacation, on the last week before Hilary term.{{citation needed|date=February 2025}} 

On Trinity Monday (the first day of Trinity Term), the Board of the college sits and elects to the Scholarship all those who achieve First in the examination. Election to become a scholar of Trinity Dublin is widely regarded as "the most prestigious undergraduate award in the country".<ref>{{Cite news|url=http://www.universitytimes.ie/2019/04/58-scholars-15-fellows-and-two-honorary-fellows-elected/|title=58 Scholars, 15 Fellows and Two Honorary Fellows Elected|newspaper=The University Times|access-date=15 December 2019|archive-date=15 December 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191215052452/http://www.universitytimes.ie/2019/04/58-scholars-15-fellows-and-two-honorary-fellows-elected/|url-status=live}}</ref> Those from EU member countries are entitled to free rooms and Commons (the college's [[Formal (university)|Formal]] Hall), an annual stipend and exemption from fees for the duration of their scholarship, which lasts 15 terms.{{citation needed|date=February 2025}} Scholars from non-EU member countries have their fees reduced by the current value of EU member fees. Scholars may add the suffix "Sch." to their names, have the note "discip. schol." appended to their name at Commencements and are entitled to wear Bachelor's Robes and a velvet mortarboard.{{citation needed|date=February 2025}}

Competition for Scholarship involves a searching examination and successful candidates must be of exceptional ability.{{citation needed|date=February 2025}} The concept of scholarship is a valued tradition of the college, and many of the college's most distinguished members were elected scholars (including Samuel Beckett and Ernest Walton).<ref>{{cite web|title=List of scholars – Scholars – TCD|url=http://www.tcdlife.ie/scholars/scholar/about-list.php|access-date=2021-05-27|website=tcdlife.ie|archive-date=15 June 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190615091340/http://www.tcdlife.ie/scholars/scholar/about-list.php|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name=":13">{{cite web|title=History of Scholars – Scholars – TCD|url=http://www.tcdlife.ie/scholars/scholar/about-history.php|access-date=2021-05-27|website=tcdlife.ie|archive-date=24 October 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201024085704/http://www.tcdlife.ie/scholars/scholar/about-history.php|url-status=live}}</ref> The Scholars' dinner, to which 'Scholars of the decade' (those elected in the current year, and every year multiple of a decade previous to it, e.g., 2013, 2003,..) are invited, forms one of the major events in Trinity's calendar.<ref name=":13" /> One of the main objectives is the pursuit of excellence, and one of the most tangible manifestations of this objective is the institution of the scholarship.<ref name=":13" />

Under the Foundation Charter (of 1592), Scholars were part of the body corporate (three Scholars were named in the charter "in the name of many").{{citation needed|date=February 2025}} Until 1609, there were about 51 Scholars at any one time. A figure of 70 was permanently fixed in the revising Letters Patent of Charles I in 1637. Trinity Monday was appointed as the day when all future elections to Fellowship and Scholarship would be announced (at this time Trinity Monday was always celebrated on the Monday after the feast of the [[Trinity Sunday|Holy Trinity]]).{{citation needed|date=February 2025}} Up to this point, all undergraduates were Scholars, but soon after 1637 the practice of admitting students other than Scholars commenced.<ref name=":13" />

Until 1856, only the classical subjects were examined. The questions concerned all the classical authors prescribed for the entrance examination and for the undergraduate course up to the middle of the Junior Sophister year.{{citation needed|date=February 2025}} The candidates had no new material to read, 'but they had to submit to a very searching examination on the fairly lengthy list of classical texts which they were supposed by this time to have mastered'.{{citation needed|date=February 2025}} The close link with the undergraduate syllabus is underlined by the refusal until 1856 to admit Scholars to the Library (a request for admission was rejected by the Board in 1842, on the grounds that Scholars should stick to their prescribed books and not indulge in 'those desultory habits' that admission to an extensive library would encourage).{{citation needed|date=February 2025}} During the second half of the 19th century, the content of the examination gradually came to include other disciplines.<ref name=":13" />

Around the turn of the 20th century, "Non-Foundation" Scholarships were introduced.{{citation needed|date=February 2025}} This initially was a device to permit women to be, in effect, elected Scholars, despite the then commonly accepted legal view that the statute revision of 1637 permitted only males to be elected Foundation Scholars. Clearly, when women were not permitted in the college, this had not caused any difficulties, but with the admission of women as full members of the college, an anomaly was created.{{citation needed|date=February 2025}} 

The Non-Foundation Scholarship granted to the women elected to it all the rights of men, with the exception of voting rights at a meeting of the Body Corporate, a very rare event in any case. As women are now admitted to Foundation Scholarship on exactly the same basis as men, Non-Foundation Scholarships are retained as a device to allow for more than 70 persons to be Scholars at any one time provided they meet the qualifying standards.{{citation needed|date=February 2025}} Foundation Scholarships are given to those whose performance is considered particularly exceptional, with the remaining qualifying persons that year being elected as Non-Foundation Scholars. While the number of Foundation Scholars remains fixed at 70, there is, in theory, no limit on the number of Non-Foundation Scholars.{{citation needed|date=February 2025}} 

Non-Foundation and Foundation Scholars receive the same benefits and therefore the two groups are regarded in equal esteem and usually refer to themselves collectively as the [[List of Scholars of Trinity College Dublin|Scholars of Trinity College Dublin]].<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.tcd.ie/calendar/undergraduate-studies/foundation-and-non-foundation-scholarships.pdf|title=Trinity College Dublin, Calendar, Undergraduate Studies Part II, Part D9, Foundation and Non-Foundation Scholarships|access-date=15 December 2019|archive-date=3 November 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191103212615/https://www.tcd.ie/calendar/undergraduate-studies/foundation-and-non-foundation-scholarships.pdf|url-status=live}}</ref>