Students not on Tesas can apply for Help

STUDENTS who are not on the Tertiary Education Student Assistance Scheme (Tesas) can apply for the Higher Education Loan Programme (Help), says Department of Higher Education Research Science and Technology (DHERST) secretary Fr Jan Czuba.
However, he said there would be conditions – to be announced soon – set by DHERST for student eligibility.
“As it is now, the Government, under the leadership of Prime Minister James Marape wants every student to be able to benefit from Help regardless of their GPA (grade point average),” he said.
Fr Czuba said the Government wanted to make sure all students would be eligible and that no one was left behind.
“We wanted to set a cutoff GPA to encourage academic standards but the prime minister wants to have a digital system in all higher education institutions to raise education standards to the same level first before doing so,” Fr Czuba said.
“Students have to guarantee that they will pay. They also have to have somebody (guarantor) to guarantee for them that the repayment will be made.
“We have a system in place that will guide students to go about applying for Help. It is a requirement that students applying for Help should produce their National Identification (NID) cards and Tax Identification Number.
“We will soon formalise an agreement with the Papua New Guinea Civil Identity Registry for fast registrations for students.
“We will also be speaking to the Internal Revenue Commission soon to make arrangements for the Tax Identification Number component of the requirement.”
He added that information about Help would be made available.