Last Wednesday, Lagos City Council approved the project for the new Municipal Regulation for the Attribution of Scholarships, which provides, among other changes, for the extension of the attribution of scholarships to students attending secondary vocational education, in situations where there is no training offer in the municipality, as well as the attribution of an additional amount to all scholarship holders who fit the definition of displaced students.
«This decision is part of an active policy to support activities of an educational nature and aims to ensure that no citizen residing in the municipality is deprived of attending higher education or vocational courses», says the municipality.
The granting of scholarships in the municipality of Lagos is an old and regular practice and the evaluation of the tenders launched allowed «to identify opportunities for improvement» to the Municipal Regulation for the Attribution of Scholarships, in force since 2017 and which has not been changed since 2020.
In this new revision, the Municipality intends to widen the scope and object of granting scholarships, making eligible, in addition to students of professional higher education and similar, undergraduate courses, master's courses and integrated master's, also students who attend the vocational route of Secondary Education, if the training offer is non-existent in the municipality.
Simplified, on the other hand, the award criteria, which are now linked exclusively to the household income and the family allowance scale of the candidates, creating two scales of scholarship amounts, 60% and 30% of the value of the IAS (Social Support Index), an amount that will be allocated monthly, for 10 months a year, as was the case before.
To these amounts will be added, in the case of students attending an educational establishment located 50 or more kilometers away from the resident council, an increase of 25 euros, as a form of travel support.
The value of the scholarship can also be accumulated with the support granted by the General Directorate of Higher Education.
The remaining amendments are intended, according to the Lagos Chamber, to 'simplify the application process and make the whole procedure, including the analysis, quicker, starting with the opening of the annual tender which starts to be launched in the 2nd fortnight of August.
The document will now be subject to a period of Public Consultation, which will then follow, with or without adjustments resulting from this participation, for approval by the Municipal Assembly, so as to take effect in the next academic year of 2023/24.
The start of the Public Consultation period and the draft of the new Regulation will be announced on the Virtual Desk on the municipality's website.
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