Scholarships for school students

JAKARTA: In a bid to ease the burden of students entering vocational schools, the Ministry of National Education plans to disburse scholarships to 180,000 students entering school this year.

"The scholarships, covering monthly tuition fees of around Rp 30,000 (US$3.19), will be given to bright students nationwide who are economically weak or have excellent records," the national education ministry's director of vocational education Gatot Hari Priowirjanto told a press conference on Monday.

Some 5,000 vocational schools can recommend up to 20 percent of there first grade students to receive the funding that will start in the next educational year.

"However, we will increase the quota for vocational schools for arts and farming by 50 percent to urge more students to come in as the number (of students in these areas) has been decreasing," he said. -- JP