Student funding: Unisa management contribute bonuses

Unisa management has contributed its bonuses for 2016—an amount of R10 million—to support fees for deserving poor students. It will augment the university’s existing contribution to top up NSFAS funding in 2016 for undergraduate and postgraduate students (R74,1 million) and the Unisa bursary fund (R11,4 million), bringing the total institutional financial aid for needy students to R95,6 million for the current year.

Prof Mandla Makhanya, Unisa Principal and Vice-Chancellor, says the contribution by his management team “is a demonstration of our commitment to ease the plight of our students and reaffirms our understanding of and sensitivity to the issues raised by them in the recent protests around fees and fee adjustments”.

“We understand the demand by students for free education, but given the challenges that this worthy cause encompasses and the reality that it cannot be achieved overnight, we thought it imperative to make our own contribution to try and alleviate the inclement conditions of our students,” says the VC.

He pointed out that there has been a steady decline in students being awarded NSFAS funds during the last two years. However, over the same period, says Makhanya, there has been an increase of 7% of students requiring NSFAS loans.

He says the drop in NSFAS-awarded loans can possibly be ascribed to the introduction of the central NSFAS application model introduced at the beginning of 2014. During this period, Unisa became part of the NSFAS pilot, which entailed that all application and award processes that previously resided with Unisa were transferred to NSFAS.

“In our assessment this step has resulted in instances where the institutional knowledge and experience that was built up and applied at Unisa prior to 2014 not being executed through the central application process, resulting in a reduced number of students being assisted through NSFAS,” says Makhanya.

In this regard, he notes with appreciation the financial support framework announced by Minister Dr Blade Nzimande recently in support of poor students, as well as the consideration given to funding middle-class students whose household income is below R600 000.

“This is a significant step forward en route to achieving the desired goal of free higher education for the poor and the ‘missing middle’. Unisa will work closely with the Department of Higher Education and Training and the National Student Fund to ensure the optimal use of the bursaries and provide sound administration of the additional resources,” says Makhanya.

He says all universities are facing the challenge of revenue enhancement and cost containment. A new balancing act will require innovative policies to increase revenues but to do so in a manner that does not deny access to students from low income households.

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