BriGuy070

There is no PDO for Germany. We have our orientation in Germany. I believe the PDOs are only for those without a full-blown commission in the home country. (Correct me if I'm wrong).

Yeah, no extra funds. Housing for the conference (at a hotel) and the language course (at a dorm) are paid for out of a separate fund, but overall it seems those values are what you have to live on. I read you can work up to Euro 400 a month without your grant benefits changed, but you would still have to get it approved.

My German level is fair, but I could always use more practice. I don't really feel comfortable speaking it because I only do so through language exchanges online and a German language group I recently started up. I wouldn't say that my project needs it per se, but I did mention I wanted it in my grant proposal. I am doing a research project on microenergy harvesting and am planning on taking courses too. I think I will take the courses in English, because even in English the concepts will be difficult to grasp, but, if I could, I would like to take them in German to make the experience more immersive. Becoming fluent in German is one of my goals to work on during the year there . I wish you luck. I guess we won't meet at the orientation because it seems the language and non-language groups are separated.

I got accepted for the Full Grant to Germany. I got a letter sent to my permanent residence (first letter came to my current address). It said I was granted the language course (which is a month earlier than the normal grant) and said that Full grants make either 750 or 1000 (if they are all but dissertation PhD students), so it looks like 750 to me. I hope that's enough. I think my affiliation professor said 900 euro/month would be good. We'll see But yay to a month longer grant, and a ramp up period to get used to speaking German and to Germany!!!! You also have a paid 2-3 week (or so) opportunity to live with a host family, ETAs and Full grants. It starts after the language course and normally at the beginning of the grant... now just to get the physical and 'apply' to my University....