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By Dylana Kneeshaw

NVIT TUITION GRANTS

New grants combination bringing major tuition savings for eligible NVIT students

Mar 11, 2020 | 4:15 PM

MERRITT — Post-secondary students in the Merritt area who are eligible for newly announced grants and bursaries could save big time on their tuition costs this fall.

Students at the Nicola Valley Institute of Technology in Merritt heard more about the benefits to come from the province’s BC Access Grants program Wednesday (Mar. 11).

Minister of Indigenous Relations & Reconciliation Scott Fraser was on campus to present details of the BC Government’s new post-secondary education initiative.

“NVIT and other post secondary institutions are all going to see a doubling of the number of students eligible for grants now. And what’s more important is the grants will be available not just for graduate degree programs, but also for two-year certificate programs, and those sorts of things,” he explains. “So it opens the door up to help many more students in this province to getting the support they need to actually get the education they need.”

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The grants will be needs-based for low-to-middle income students, and Fraser says that will cover a sizable portion of tuition costs for a two-year program at NVIT.

“Up to $4,000 per-student, per-year. So it makes up a big chunk of costs for a student. And the fact is, if you’ve got a two-year certificate course, you were previously not eligible for grant funding, and you are now.”

Fraser says current grant funding programs provide money after the fact, so he says the new grant system will improve access to education by making the up-front costs more affordable.

The grants can also be used in conjunction with NVIT’s new immediate entry bursaries.

Last week, NVIT President and CEO Ken Tourand announced the school has expanded the bursary program to provide one year of free tuition at the school for all eligible Indigenous Grade 12 students in B.C. The bursaries can be used at either the Vancouver, or Merritt NVIT campus.

“And so students can not only do that, but they can also apply for the student access grant,” says Tourand. “And like Minister Fraser mentioned, it’s $4,000 up to a two-year program, and then $1,000 for a third or a fourth year program as well.”

BC Access Grants will be available to university students this September, and between the two funding programs NVIT students can utilize, enrollment is expected to grow in the next several years. Currently, Tourand says the school has just more than 1,500 students with about 700 full time equivalent students (FTEs) enrolled.

“And that’s with the immediate entry bursary just within our local school districts,” he notes. “So now that we’re opening up to the province it’s probably going to take a couple of years for it to start resonating throughout the province, but we’re hoping that maybe we can get to 1,000 FTEs at some point in time.”