62,500 needy students in Nairobi to get bursaries

 

At least 62,500 bright and needy students in Nairobi County will finally receive bursaries for their secondary education.

This is after City Hall said they will be disbursing Sh457 million in bursaries to the students from poor backgrounds.

Nairobi County Education Executive Janet Ouko said that the funds were meant to be disbursed in the financial year ending June 30, 2020. The exercise had been delayed due to wrangles at the county government. 

“We were not able to disburse bursaries during the 2019/2020 financial year due to various reasons. But we have now been able to fast track the process and we will be giving out the bursaries tomorrow (Tuesday),” said Ms Ouko on Monday.

She explained that the county government operates two levels of bursaries including the Sh297.5 million ward bursary funds as well as the Executive or Governor’s bursary fund.

The ward bursary fund is administered by each ward representative. Each ward receives Sh3.5 million to be disbursed  to 700 beneficiaries. 

For the executive bursary, Ms Ouko said they have 3,000 students enrolled under the programme with each getting between Sh45,000 and Sh53,000 as per the Ministry of Education fees guidelines. The beneficiaries are assured of support for the four years they will be in school.

 “It is up to the area MCA with his bursary committee to identify the bright but needy students from their wards to benefit from the Sh3.5 million. Each student gets Sh5,000. This is also given to those in tertiary education like driving school, hairdressing and so on,” said Ms Ouko.

“The Executive Fund is administered by the Executive on behalf of the governor where 1,000 needy but bright students from public primary schools are considered. We take the top three from these schools unless those in the top three are not needy then we consider the next student to benefit working closely with the respective head teachers,” she added.

 She said the Executive Fund beneficiaries have to attend public secondary schools and not private ones to qualify for the bursary and must all be performers.

 “This is the third year since former Governor Mike Sonko took over and so we have three cohorts from form one to form three. So in total, we are looking at 3,000 beneficiaries but we sometimes consider more when we get a very special case,” she said.

At the same time, Ms Ouko said the county government is looking into bringing back on board about 1,000 Executive Fund beneficiaries dropped by Mr Sonko after taking over from former Governor Evans Kidero regime.

 “There are discussions for those children now in Form Four to be reconsidered, budget allowing. It is very unfortunate that a child has to drop out of school because they are victimised on the basis of their name,” said the Education CEC.

COURTESY OF DAILY NATION