— parents asked to check schedule for pick-up locations

THE Ministry of Education, on Friday, released the schedule for distribution of the $25,000 “Because We Care” cash grant and $5000 uniform voucher and Minister of Education, Priya Manickchand, called on parents to keenly check the schedule to see the location and date for their pick up.

Distribution of the monies will commence on August 2 and run until August 5. Any parent failing to make it on the designated day of distribution will have to await the completion of the process to be given a different date to uplift their grant from the ministry’s office, directly.

The distribution scheduled for each respective region is posted on the ministry’s social media pages, and has also been shared by the minister on her official Facebook page. Additionally the ministry has also set up a WhatsApp hotline on 652-9145 whereby parents can make enquiries.

This year distribution will see some schools group with others at a single location; hence, in some cases parents will not necessarily be uplifting the money at the school that the child attends. As such, the minister is calling on parents to find out early where their distribution location will be.

Minister Manickchand explained too that this was done to pool resources, particularly personnel, in cases where schools had smaller number of children.
“We have had to group some schools. Every location will have education officers, teachers, auditors from the Auditor General’s Department and policemen and women…. We’re asking you to pay attention to the schedule,” the minister emphasised.

AVOID OVERCROWDING
Notwithstanding the consolidation of schools, Manickchand noted that efforts were made not to put too many students at any one particular location so as to avoid overcrowding.
“Except the school has more than a thousand children, we don’t really have more than a thousand persons at any location unlike last year,” the minister noted.

Minister Manickchand on Friday held a live question and answer video segment on her page where she fielded questions from the general public and also commented on how happy she was to know that parents would be able to receive their grants early to facilitate timely purchasing of school supplies.

The $25,000 “Because We Care” cash grant and $5,000 uniform voucher will be given for each learner from nursery to secondary, in private and public schools who were listed on a school register as at 30 June.
As such, year one nursery school pupils will be able to access the facility once they were registered by June 30 at a particular school; however, Grade 11 and Grade 13 learners will not be issued grants.

In the case of Grade 11 students, they will be issued grants if they subsequently register for Grade 12, which is not a mandatory level. Minister Manickchand related that these students will receive their grant at a later time in October when they are expected to conclude registering for Sixth Form.

“This is a grant to assist the parent for the new academic year between September 2022 and June 2023. So if you will not be in school in September 2022, then you’re not entitled to the grant. So school leavers in second year [Sixth Form] are not entitled to the grant. [Fifth form] students leaving school will not be entitled to the grant. If they’re coming back into school to do Sixth Form then they will get the grant sometime around October,” the minister explained.

DESIGNATED APPOINTED PERSON
In cases where parents cannot attend to uplift their grant, they can send a designated appointed person with an authorisation letter to uplift the money in their stead.
This year’s total assistance of $30,000 is a marked increase from the $19,000 “Because We Care” cash grant and the school uniform and supplies grants that were given out last year.

Amounting to an additional $2.2 billion, the education cash grant is part of the $74.4 billion budget for the education sector this year.
The “Because We Care” cash grant and uniform voucher are part of welfare measures being implemented by the government to put more disposable income into the hands of parents and increase school attendance of learners, particularly those disadvantaged because their parents could not always afford the basic necessities.

The government, in its manifesto, had promised that by 2025, each child will receive $50,000.
The “Because We Care” project started in 2014 under the People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) Government and saw parents receiving cash grants of $10,000 per child in the public school system.

However, when the A Partnership for National Unity + Alliance For Change (APNU+AFC) assumed office in 2015, the party discontinued the grant. When the PPP/C returned to Government in 2020, they upheld their promise to restore the grant and increase it.