Govt. to pay subject fees for CAPE students
Apr 11, 2025
Kaieteur News- Following his public announcement that government will pay the exam fees for up to eight Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate (CSEC) subjects for every student across the country, President Irfaan Ali said on Thursday that the same offer is extended to students at the Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examination (CAPE) level.
Students in an examination room. (Photo courtesy, Ministry of Education/ Facebook)
The President said this during a live broadcast aired at State House, Georgetown.
Noting that throughout this term of office his government will be implementing a wide array of similar measures and projects aimed at improving livelihoods, the Head-of-State related yesterday “I will ensure that no child is compelled to limit the number of CXC subjects they write on account of the financial circumstances of their parents and this initiative goes beyond CSEC, it will also include the CAPE students and they too will benefit from this initiative.”
This publication had reported that this initiative will benefit students at both public and private schools. Elaborating on the President’s announcement during his weekly press conference on Thursday, Vice President (VP) Bharrat Jagdeo said the decision was made after they received reports that the subvention that the government was providing for exam fees was not reaching the rightful beneficiaries.
“Some people have been coming to us saying that the subvention…every year we used to spend about $260 million to assist people to pay for CSEC and CAPE if they couldn’t afford it but we were not pleased with the way it’s being applied because sometimes people don’t know they can apply for this and often it doesn’t get to the intended beneficiaries because it is determined through a capricious process by teachers and others,” he explained.
Noting that this initiative will cost around $600 million, the VP related that this will remove a huge burden from parents moving forward.
“In the next term in office, you will see much more of this, not just the increase of the $50,000 per child per year grant but the process of removing the burden from parents to fund education for their children at every level. So, this would help to ensure that people can keep more of the income that they have and use it for other purposes because the government will ensure that we progressively fund education and the educational needs of our people from the treasury directly,” he added.
It was also reported that the payment of the exam fees will commence from this year.
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