The National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Postgraduate Association (NATSIPA) condemns the Australian Government and the Labor Party for supporting the cutting of Student Start-up Scholarships, a move that will further disadvantages Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Postgraduate Students.
The Start-up Scholarships, introduced in 2010, enables students to access up to $2,050 a year in funding for books, computers and other study related items. The funding vital to Low-SES students will be replaced in 2015 with a low-income HECS-style loan scheme. Making a 2 year masters degree $4100 dearer or a 3 year PhD $6150 more expensive.
“This government has a neo-liberal agenda that obviously puts profits before people,” said NATSIPA President Sharlene Leroy-Dyer. “If this government and Labor are serious about closing the gap on Indigenous disadvantage, then education should be a priority”.
The Start-up Scholarships are vital to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Postgraduate students as the majority are mature age students supporting families. This leaves very little funds for basic “Start-up” resources, therefore without the ‘Start-up” scholarship many students will not have the resources needed to ensure positive yearly outcomes.
With the introduction of the loan scheme students will now be faced with tough decision of going into further debt or missing out on vital study needs.
“We seem to be going on an unpleasantly familiar merry-go-round,” said NATSIPA Vice-President Sadie Heckenberg, referring to the Student Financial Supplement Scheme introduced in 1993 and scrapped 10 years later in 2003. “Why bring something back in that has failed and been dumped before, and that disadvantages students?”
This change to student funding is another nail in the coffin for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Postgraduate Students who in 2014 faced harsh cuts to ITAS funding and severe restrictions to overseas research travel under new ABSTUDY rules.
This government needs to reversed this decision, stop making itself look good and start caring for those most vulnerable in our country
Sharlene Leroy-Dyer / President / natsipa1@gmail.com
