Seeking guidance: GitHub Education enrolment for remote student

[joaomnarciso]

Hi everyone,

I am having ongoing difficulties getting my GitHub Education account approved and I am hoping someone here can guide me.

I am a Portuguese citizen residing in Germany and currently enrolled in a Portuguese university, where I am completing a distance learning Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science. I hold a valid digital student ID, a university email address, and my institution is listed among the selectable universities during the GitHub Education enrolment process.

My residence is the same as the one shown on my student card, which I submitted, and it also matches the billing information on my GitHub account.

However, my application is consistently flagged because I am accessing GitHub from a different country than my university. Despite providing all requested documentation, my application has been rejected three times.

In the past, the support contact form included options to follow up on GitHub Education enrolments. Unfortunately, all GitHub Education related options have since been removed, and users are now redirected to this community board instead. As a result, there appears to be no direct way to contact GitHub Support regarding this specific issue. Resolving it would likely require submitting additional documents or private information, which I cannot share on a public forum.

My university has confirmed that this is related to GitHub’s policies and is outside their control. Colleagues located in Portugal were approved without any issues, while some colleagues studying abroad encountered the same problem and eventually gave up due to the lack of a support channel.

Is there any recommended approach to resolve this situation, or any way to escalate or clarify this type of case with GitHub?

Best regards,
João

[shinybrightstar]

Hi @joaomnarciso

We’ve clarified our stance on using generative AI tools like ChatGPT within our Community via this announcement. Please review the guidelines to ensure your post meets them as failure to adhere to those rules can result in action taken by our moderator team.  You can read our updated Code of Conduct and the announcement for more details. Thank you for helping us maintain an authentic and beneficial space for everyone.

[MaxRolseth]

A response that isnt AI generated:

Have you tried using a VPN to trick it to thinking you are in Portugal instead of Germany?

[realsunil]

I would not recommend using a VPN for GitHub Education verification.
VPN/proxy usage is commonly flagged by fraud/risk systems and can actually increase the chances of rejection or even temporarily lock/limit the account.

✅ Safer options that do work better:

1. Apply using strong official proof of enrollment (recent enrollment certificate + university letter + current term details)
2. Make sure the university email is verified and used on the GitHub account
3. Apply from a normal, stable connection (no VPN/proxy)
4. If João is able to visit Portugal, submitting from there using a normal local connection may help (because it aligns naturally), but VPN is still not a good idea.

So yes, changing location signal can help sometimes, but doing it through a VPN is risky — a legitimate connection + stronger documents is the safest approach.