Only 5 Prof & Tech Scholarships Available this Year!

Patrick Faber

The Ministry of Education is tightening its belt as it makes cuts across most of its programmes as schools prepare to reopen in August.  The annual Professional and Technical Scholarships is getting cut by more than fifty percent.  Minister Patrick Faber explained on Monday that it will now be extremely competitive for applicants and that there will be no crumbs this time around for law and medicine students.

Patrick Faber, Minister of Education

“It is around this time, and maybe we are a bit late, that we would announce the Professional and Technical Scholarships. These are the only fully loaded scholarships that the Ministry offers outside of Belize, mostly to our partners at the UWI, however, we have over time allowed for this scholarship to be applicable to schools in the commonwealth, so if it is New Zealand, England, Canada – any of our commonwealth countries, we allow for these scholarships to be put to use at institutions in these countries. Traditionally, we have offered up to a dozen scholarships per year but this year it will be limited to only five and so it is going to be very competitive. These scholarships are not necessarily offered on merit and offered based on the area of priorities of the government. I remind folks that law and medicine are not among those priorities.”

Faber also announced that the University of Belize will be seeing cuts, among other programmes.