Minister of Education, Priya Manickchand on Saturday commenced the distribution of the $4,000 school uniform and supplies voucher programme in Region 6, East Berbice-Corentyne.
Over 22,000 students in the region will be benefiting from the programme at an approximate cost of $90M.
Minister Manickchand, during an interview with reporters at the Leeds Primary school, said the project is aimed at reducing the financial burden on parents, while at the same them, improve their quality of life and allow them the opportunity to have money in their pockets.
“We are very pleased to bring this; this is just a small part of the kind of assistance we intend to give that will complement the high quality teaching we want in the classrooms, because we know that building fancy schools, which we intend to do, and training teachers, putting furniture in the schools sometimes is not enough to reach every household.
“We need to look at what individual needs are. As you see, the high rise buildings going up and as you see the roads being built, we want people to feel in their pockets lighter…we want to be able to ensure people feel can have a better quality of life,” Minister Manickchand said.
She said next year, parents will see the return of the $15,000 cash grant and over time, they can expect the grant to raise incrementally to $50,000 per child.
The distribution started at the Tagore Memorial High School and continued throughout the day at various secondary, primary and nursery schools across the region.