Government to raise income cap and size of student bursaries

Singapore

THE government will raise the income thresholds for student bursaries and raise the bursary amounts to make higher education more accessible to students from lower and middle-income households.

The move, which will cost the state up to $147 million more per year, will allow some 120,000 students - from about two-thirds of households - to benefit from bursaries, starting from academic year 2014. Speaking in parliament yesterday during the Committee of Supply debate on his ministry's budget, Education Minister Heng Swee Keat said that the bursaries come on top of the "very high level of subsidies" that all those enrolled in institutes of higher learning (IHLs) already enjoy.