On Monday morning, we saw the National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) Board and Executive Management, led by the Acting Chairperson, Prof. Lourens Van Staden, hold a press briefing addressing the registration process, payment of allowances and the student accommodation pilot project.
Currently, NSFAS only has one office, located in Cape Town. Van Staden announced that plans are in place to have NSFAS offices available to students and applicants in all provinces.
To further ensure NSFAS presence is here in all provinces, we are hard at work to finalise our plans to have operational offices in all our provinces.
He continued to say that more details will be provided once plans are concluded.
At the beginning of every year, challenges relating to registration surface. To tackle this, NSFAS has deployed servicing administrators to all institutions to assist students for the past two weeks.
“NSFAS aims to alleviate the tensions and contribute to a harmonious academic environment for all our institutions," said the NSFAS executive.
It is through this intervention that we will continue to ensure the unmediated and seamless interaction between NSFAS and all it’s beneficiaries. As a scheme, we acknowledge that this transition required a significant increase in NSFAS financial resources, effective and efficient information and communication technologies and capable personnel to drive this transition phase.
"These unquestionable system changes will propel NSFAS to be agile in handling a large number of student applications, process them timeously and give feedback to all applicants without any delays. This we are determined to do.”
NSFAS funding has increased from R21.4 million in 1991, when it was introduced, to almost R50 billion now to broaden access to post school education and training.
