By MP for Hougang SMC, Png Eng Huat
[Delivered in Committee of Supply on 7 March 2014]
Madam, every year, International Students receive about $12,000 to $75,000 each to study at our Institutions of Higher Learning. In total, the Government dispenses about $210 million in tuition grants per year to these students.
This is not a small sum of money and the only requirement the Government asks of these International Students is to work for a Singapore-based company for a period of 3 years upon their graduation with no other strings attached.
The grant application is so easy that even the sureties required to complete the application need not be Singaporeans nor reside here. And to fulfil the 3-year employment obligation agreement, the foreign student can work full-time or part-time, locally or overseas, give tuition at a tuition centre, and even be self-employed.
If the same student wishes to pursue a full-time undergraduate programme at our local tertiary institutions, he can defer his existing grant obligation, get another subsidy with another 3-year grant obligation, and serve both his obligations concurrently upon getting the undergraduate degree.
After pulling out all the stops for these foreign Students, how many of them took advantage of our generosity and left Singapore without serving a single day of the 3-year grant obligation?
MOE is currently unable to provide a definitive answer to this question. Even among the current group of International Students who had not started work upon graduation and/or who have not sought permission to do so, MOE did not want to reveal the number of defaulters in this group. I understand the ministry is tightening its tracking and enforcement efforts for bond fulfilment and I hope we will have a clear answer one day.
Madam, the Tuition Grant Scheme was started in 1980. The Government would have dished out billions of dollars in tuition grants to tens of thousands of International Students to date. It is hard to fathom that we do not know for sure how many foreign students took the liberty to ignore their obligations the past 34 years.
We even roll out the red carpet for these foreign students that if they become Citizens, they will be released from serving the grant obligation. For that, I would like to ask the Minister, how many of them had done so to date?
MOE cannot tighten the tracking and enforcement efforts without first tightening the terms and conditions of the Tuition Grant Scheme. Allowing an international student to have sureties living overseas is as good as having no sureties at all because we all know how hard it is to enforce our contracts beyond the shores of Singapore.
Our Government dishes out all kinds of grants to Singaporeans. In public housing, there are strict rules governing the disbursement of grants and some grants must be paid back with interests with no exception. It is certainly not acceptable for some International Students to work our system, take our grants, and make a mockery out of our generosity.
Source: WP.Sg