THE Ministry of Education, through the Government’s ‘Because we Care’ cash grant, on Wednesday distributed more than $130M to parents of children attending public schools on the East Bank and East Coast of Demerara. 

The following schools were serviced at the Diamond Secondary School: Diamond Secondary, Grove Nursery, Diamond Primary, and the Special Needs School.
During her address to some 1,164 parents and guardians at the Diamond Secondary School on the East Bank of Demerara, Education Minister, Priya Manickchand stated that when the Government of Guyana started planning for the cash grant initiative in 2013, its main objective was to ensure that parents receive additional support to send their children to school.

IT WILL HELP
She noted that while the $10,000 is not meant to meet all the needs a family might have, it will certainly help some parents to materialise a few plans to effectively help their children.
Manickchand said that they wanted to issue the grant before the new school term, understanding the predicament some parents might have faced.
“We wanted to make sure that we are able to reach more students, if we had done it before we would have been leaving out over 4,000 students.” She further said that the ministry had requested from all schools across Guyana the list of names on the register in order to determine the numbers collectively as well as at individual schools.

REGIONS 7 and 8
The Education Minister said that this distribution across Guyana should be finished “by Saturday of next week where we would have served over 200,000 students, one of the biggest services to be given across the entire country.” She also said that next week, the ministry will be doing their distribution in Regions 7 and 8.
Manickchand explained to those gathered that according to local statistics as well as international reports written about the country, Guyana is doing better as a country and because of this the Government of Guyana can invest in giving parents the additional support.
ECONOMICALLY ABLE
“We are able to give $10,000 as a grant this year because we can do it economically and because we care about your families’ welfare.” She observed that some parents said they will be doing other things with the money which will indirectly benefit their children since they would have gotten all their school supplies. The Minister said, “This grant is more income in your house so you can make your child’s life better” in whatever way necessary.
She added that like other programmes implemented by the Government, the ‘Because We Care’ $10,000 cash grant initiative will grow. She made reference to the Uniform Programme, which was started to provide assistance to only underprivileged children. She related that the Uniform Programme has expanded to include every child in the public school system and also similar progress has been made in other programmes such as the School Feeding Programme.

ATTENDANCE CONDITION
The Education Minister called on parents to do more to ensure that their children succeed at school. She added that next year the Ministry is seriously considering applying a condition to the Cash Grant Programme where only children with a certain percentage of attendance at school will benefit.
Parents have until November 30, 2014 to en-cash their vouchers at any Western Union or Bill Express location.