K200mil for student loan scheme

By CLIFFORD FAIPARIK
Prime Minister Peter O’Neill says the Government will allocate K200 million for a new student loan scheme this year for students attending tertiary institutions.
“This year I will get the student loan scheme off the ground,” he said.
“We start off with about K200 million for the loan scheme and we hope that our oil price remains the same. This is the money that will kick start the loan scheme for students going to tertiary institutions. We are now drafting the legislation and will take it to parliament very soon.
“This is going to change how we educate our children throughout the country. But we still need to maintain the current education standard.”
O’Neill also called on the Education Department to quickly implement the standard-based education curriculum.
“Changing back to the SBE curriculum is important. And we must coordinate ourselves so that we are delivering the best opportunity to our children and our people.
“Now we are going back to SBE, but please don’t take another five years. Outcome-base-education has done enough damage to our children,” O’Neill said.
“Parents are telling us that OBE is bad. Why does it have to take so long to implement SBE? Get your act together. Education department needs to get the SBE out there.
“If someone is not performing, get him or her out. Next year kids have to have an opportunity to learn at an early age. Curriculum needs to be updated on a constant basis. That is the sort of education that we want to have.”