Foreign Students get 7 Times More than Singaporeans?

More undergrads get financial aid

According to the Straits Times news report “More undergrads seeking financial aid, and getting it” (Dec 31) – “Before 2011, its (NUS) students from households with a monthly per capita income of about $500 could each receive $3,250 in bursaries annually. Today, they can each get between $5,000 and $9,000 every year.”

Minimum bursary is $5,000 but example get only $2,000?

However, the news report goes on to say that “The extra support is a relief for many students. Ms Madelene Liou, 22, a final-year student at NTU’s school of chemistry and biological chemistry quit waitressing part-time after getting an MOE bursary. This gave her $800 each in her first two years in NTU, and $2,000 each in the last two years.”

The above seems to contradict the former as how can she be receiving just $2,000 a year, when “each get between $5,000 and $9,000 every year”?

So many numbers don’t add up

Here are some more numbers which seem to be contradictory too.

NUS average $2,190 per scholarship/bursary recipient

The average that per scholarship and bursary recipient received in NUS last year was $2,190 ($10 million divided by 4,566 recipients).

NTU average $3,648 per bursary recipient

In contrast, the average per bursary recipient in NTU was $3,648 ($22 million divided by 6,200 local students). Since the NUS data given did not breakdown into scholarships and bursaries – the NUS average should be more than NTU’s average for bursaries only, because scholarships give much more than bursaries (tuition plus $7,900 in the example cited).

So, why is NTU’s average bursary of $3,648 – 67 per cent more than NUS’s average scholarship/bursary of $2,190? (Note: the NTU figure does not include $18.8 million of scholarships for which 7,000 applied)

NTU has more than double the number of needy students than NUS?

Also, it would seem rather odd that NTU appears to have so much more needy students (6,200 bursaries + an unknown number of scholarships which 7,000 applied) than NUS’s total of 4,566 (scholarships plus bursaries).

SMU average $4,879 per scholarship/bursary recipient – 123% more than NUS?

Interesting, SMU’s average scholarship/bursary was even higher at $4,879 ($11.3 million divided by 2,316 recipients) – which is a whopping 123 per cent more than NUS’s $2,190. Why is this so?

Only used 7% of donations to help needy students?

Moreover, since “NUS provost also said donations enable it to support more students. It received $144.7 million in FY2013, up from $94 million in FY2009″ – why is it that only $10 million or seven per cent of the donations were used for financial aid (scholarships and bursaries)?

How much spent on foreign students?

Actually, we are only getting half the story, as how much scholarships did our public universities give to foreign students?

$144m a year on foreign undergraduate students

It was revealed in Parliament in February 2012 that foreign undergraduate students get $36 million  a year in scholarships. Since the typical course duration is about four years – the amount spent on foreign students’ scholarships was about $144 million a year.

$? a year on graduate foreign students

And what about scholarships for graduate foreign students in masters and doctoral courses, that has never been disclosed.

$210m tuition grants on foreign students