Our Mission
WikiCounsellor exists to make accurate, primary-source-based information about international graduate scholarships and student-visa pathways freely accessible to prospective students, their families, and academic advisers. Most of the websites that currently dominate search results in this category are aggregators that republish out-of-date figures without citation, or marketing sites for paid consultancy services. Students making life-affecting decisions deserve a more careful reference.
We publish two kinds of content: structured program briefings — covering scholarships such as DAAD, Chevening, Erasmus Mundus, Fulbright, Vanier, MEXT, and Australia Awards — and long-form editorial guidance on application strategy, document preparation, and post-study work-visa rules. Every page is written from the perspective of a careful first-time applicant who needs to know exactly where each figure or rule comes from.
WikiCounsellor is not affiliated with any university, government, or scholarship-awarding body. We do not represent applicants, do not charge for placement, and do not accept compensation from any organisation we cover. The only commercial activity on the site is display advertising; sponsorships, paid placement, and affiliate links are not used.
Sourcing & Citations
Every figure published on WikiCounsellor — stipend amounts, deadlines, eligibility rules, and visa requirements — is taken from the awarding body's official 2026 documentation or the relevant statute. Where multiple sources conflict, we cite the primary source (the awarding body or the statute itself) and note the discrepancy openly.
Examples of the primary sources we use:
- DAAD — the official scholarship database at daad.de for German programs.
- Erasmus+— the European Commission's Erasmus Mundus catalogue for EU joint master programs.
- Fulbright — the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs (U.S. Department of State) directory of the Foreign Student Program.
- Chevening— the FCDO-administered Chevening Secretariat's published 2026 cycle guidance.
- Statutes — for visa pathway writing we cite the law directly: §16b/§20 AufenthG (Germany), INA §212(e) (United States), Directive (EU) 2016/801, Subclass 500/485/482 (Australia), and similar primary references.
Stipends are normalised to euros using publicly available exchange data so that figures across programs can be compared sensibly. We do not estimate, infer, or interpolate values. Where a primary source is silent on a particular question, the page says so explicitly rather than fabricating an answer.
Editorial Integrity
WikiCounsellor will not publish, recommend, or facilitate any service that compromises academic integrity. This includes — and is not limited to — essay-writing services, statement-of-purpose ghostwriting, fake recommendation letters, fabricated transcripts, paid impersonation in standardized tests, and document forgery in visa applications.
Our application-strategy guidance is developmental. We explain what selection committees evaluate, illustrate structure with anonymised excerpts, and offer feedback on the applicant's own work. We do not write personal statements or research proposals on a student's behalf.
On the use of generative AI: we permit AI tools for non-factual editorial work — copy-editing, accessibility passes, and routine proofreading. Every public claim of fact, deadline, eligibility rule, stipend value, or visa requirement is written and reviewed by a human editor against a primary source before publication.
Corrections. If you find an error, please write to the editorial desk via the Contact page with the URL of the affected page and the primary source you believe contradicts it. Verified corrections are made promptly, and where the error could have materially affected a reader's decision we add a visible correction note at the top of the page.
Who Writes for WikiCounsellor
Founder & Managing Editor
Ali Sherazi
Ali Sherazi founded WikiCounsellor in 2026 after several years of independently researching international graduate scholarship pathways for prospective students from South Asia, the Middle East, and East Africa. His work focuses on reading awarding-body documentation and immigration statutes carefully and translating them into reference material that first-time applicants can actually use to make decisions.
Ali oversees editorial direction, sourcing standards, and the corrections process. Every page on this site is reviewed by him against the cited primary source before publication.
- Editorial contact
- editorial@wikicounsellor.com
- Based in
- Pakistan · Independent publisher
WikiCounsellor is published independently. Ali leads research and editorial work directly; outside contributors, when added, will be listed under their own names with verifiable credentials. We do not publish synthetic biographies for staff members who do not exist, and we do not list affiliations we cannot evidence.
For press, partnership, awarding-body verification, or correction requests, write to editorial@wikicounsellor.com or use the Contact page. Good-faith verification queries are answered in writing.