The Permanent Secretary for the Public Service, Mr Parmesh Chand said 200 new Public Service Commission Scholarships have been awarded for 2010 with 170 for local scholarships.
Mr Chand said last year only 150 scholarships were awarded, however this year has seen an increase in the allocation of scholarships by 30 for overseas scholarship recipients.
He added that last year’s decline was due to students accepting awards from other sponsorship agencies such as Ministry of Indigenous Affairs, Multi-Ethnic Affairs and AusAid in addition to the limited number of qualified candidates as replacements.
“The Fiji College of Advanced Education list has been finalized and the awardees have been notified, similarly awardees to the University of the South Pacific, Fiji School of Medicine, University of Fiji and Umanand Prasad School of Medicine have been finalized. “With new awardees for Lautoka’s Teachers College, Fiji College of Agriculture and Corpus Christi Teachers College, theirs will be published in the papers by their respective agencies soon. However, FIT and overseas awards are yet to be finalized,” Mr Chand said.
He said some of the problems faced by the Scholarship Unit while processing scholarship applications were the incomplete documents provided by the applicants or applicants applying for non-advertised programs and incomplete information provided such as their current school or status and telephone contacts.
Each year the Public Service Commission sponsors students to study in various institutions of their choice either at USP,FCAE, LTC, Fiji College of Agriculture, Corpus Christi Teachers College, University of Fiji, Umanand Prasad School of Medicine, FSM, and FIT.