A total of USD 3.59 million has been disbursed to students pursing higher education through the government’s scholarship schemes as of April this year, the Ministry of Higher Education, Labour and Skills Development has said.
Staring the latest statistics on the scholarship schemes and the government’s free degree programme, the Higher Education Ministry said a total of 751 scholarship students were supported with this amount. This includes 34 students ( 25 female and 9 male) who have now successfully completed their scholarships and 717 students (456 female and 250 male) who are currently pursuing their studies.
In addition, USD 3.35 million has been disbursed under the free degree programme to support 8,327 students across the country. This includes 5,258 female and 3,069 male students.
The Higher Education Ministry earlier said they have received a total of 1338 applications for student loans for higher education in the Maldives. Of these, 913 were applications from new students, while 259 were top-up applications from students already studying under existing student loans. So far, 646 applications have been reviewed by the Ministry.
This year's loan scheme will give priority to those who apply for highly technical fields, with two-thirds of the loan allocations reserved for this category. Those who apply for loans to pursue higher education in these field will receive an additional 10 points in the selection process.
The Ministry has earlier stated that following President Dr Mohamed Muizzu’s decision to make student loans Sharia compliant, there will be no interest incurred on student loans, and no administrative fee charged.
Over USD 52 million has been disbursed as student loans as of end of last year and USD 4.6 million as of February this year, according to the Ministry.