Learners with disabilities set for university education and vocational education and training (TVET) will receive 80 percent scholarships and 20 percent loans according to the new education funding model by the national government.
Speaking during a media engagement workshop in Nakuru, the Universities Fund Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Geoffrey Monari said the new funding formulae seeks to offer students whose households are at the bottom of the pyramid equal opportunity in accessing university education and technical and vocational education and training (TVET).
According to Kenya University and College Central Placement Services (KUCCPS) Chief Executive Dr. Officer Mercy Wahome, the move will enhance equality, fairness, and transparency in apportioning government scholarships and loans to those seeking University and college admissions.
Wahome while voicing the government’s commitment to safeguarding the quality of programmes and courses being offered at the institutions of higher learning, indicated that the funding model was crafted to address the uniform and inequitable capitation witnessed under the differentiated unit cost (DUC) model, where the rich and the poor students received the same amount.
Unlike what has been the case, Dr Wahome explained that the universities and TVETs will no longer receive block funding in the form of capitation based on the DUC whose sustainability had been a struggle following dipping in funding ratios from the government.
Instead, she added that the government resolved that university funding shall be apportioned to individual students according to their level of need.
State Department for Basic Education Principal Secretary Belio Kipsang last week said the criteria to be used during funding will include a choice of the programme, household income band, affirmative performance, and government priority areas.
To facilitate the implementation of the new framework, Dr. Kipsang disclosed that the government had increased funding for university education to Sh84.6 billion from Sh54 billion allocated in the financial year starting July as loans and grants.
SOURCE: KNA