COVID-19: Number Of Student Loan Applications To Rise
By Daniel Itai, Johannesburg, South Africa
The National Students Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS)’s Media Liaison Officer, Phatisa Ntlonze, has said the financial aid scheme is set to receive it’s highest number of applications ever.
Ntlonze has since attributed the high application rates to the current COVID-19 pandemic which has since left many homes without a viable source of income due to loss of employment.
“We are seeing a larger number of applicants since we opened in August which we haven’t seen in other years. On average we are receiving 5 000 applications per day and we are now close to reaching the 500 000 mark however, we are anticipating more applicants,” said Ntlonze.
Ntlonze further advised prospective applicants not to lose heart just because they were a lot applying citing that NSFAS would take note of every applicant who met their criteria.
“The number doesn’t matter as long as that student qualifies for the funding criteria. Moreover, we have the appeal process for those that might not have met the criteria because your parent or guardian was working but they are now not working, we do consider that appeal provided they are supporting documents for your appeal such as the retrenchment letter.
We also take appeals for those students who might not meet NSFAS’s academic criteria so that it can be moved to the following year because you only apply once,” added Ntlonze.
The Media Liaison Officer also said NSFAS was still waiting on the Higher Education Minister, Blade Nzimande, on whether or not the NSFAS allowance was going to be extended beyond this year since the current tertiary academic calendar was extended to February 2021.
“We are not sure on whether the allowance will be extended we have to wait to hear from the Minister,” added Ntlonze.
@danielItai_zw
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