A total of 203 students have benefitted from the 2010 Student Loan Scheme, the majority of recipients from the University of the South Pacific, with a total of 85.

Permanent Secretary for the Public Service Commission Parmesh Chand confirmed that the Scheme is another initiative for reaching out to children of underprivileged families and towards a better future.

Chand confirmed they received a total of 965 applications altogether from the Northern, Western and Central Divisions, and even after the candidates were short listed to 203, they received 74 late entries.

The breakdown for the 2010 Student Loan Scheme awards in terms of Tertiary Institutions is 62 to the Fiji Institute of Technology, 21 to the Fiji School of Nursing, 10 to the University of Fiji and Fiji College of Advanced Education, 7 to Corpus Christie, 5 to MBBS and 3 to the Fiji School of Medicine.

Chand said the onus is now on students benefitting from the Student Loan Scheme to study hard, gain relevant qualification, find a job and then repay the loan so that other needy students can also qualify from the repaid funds.