Gov’t Contemplating Removing SLB Loan Guarantor Requirement for All Applicants

The Government is actively considering removing the guarantor requirement for Students’ Loan Bureau (SLB) applicants.

This was disclosed by Prime Minister, the Most Hon. Andrew Holness, while responding to a question posed regarding higher education during his rap session with students at the Guy’s Hill High School in St. Catherine on Thursday (January 18).

“Let’s start with what is generally available, and that is the student loan. You know that this Administration has removed the requirement for having two guarantors, so now you only need one. But we are also actively considering removing this business of a guarantor,” the Prime Minister said.

Effective April 1, 2021, students applying for an SLB loan now only require one guarantor instead of two.

Additionally, since September 2023, Programme of Advancement Through Health and Education (PATH) beneficiaries applying to the SLB do not need guarantors to support their submissions.

The no-guarantor policy also applies to wards of the State.

Prime Minister Holness also indicated that various grants are available for students.

“If qualified under PATH, if you’re a student whose family is on PATH, then you get a grant, a fairly substantial grant to go to [a] tertiary institution; and if you are a student from an underserved community, a student who is in a vulnerable situation, then there are other grants for which you can apply and your circumstances will be assessed and you can get a grant,” he pointed out.

Meanwhile Mr. Holness said the Government has instituted measures to offer several scholarships for students pursuing studies in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM).

“[Approximately] 100 of them have been awarded by the Ministry of Finance [and the Public Service] for our students to study in the STEM field. We have also put in place several other programmes where we sponsor people in critical skills, and there are many scholarships [for] which you have to go through the Ministry of Finance,” he informed.

The Prime Minister pointed out that several scholarship opportunities are provided by other local and overseas institutions and agencies and encouraged students to apply for these.

He said the Government remains committed to achieving universal secondary education and financing the expansion of education in Jamaica.

“And we will continue, as our budget allows us, to expand the sixth-form opportunities right across the country; and as you turn out to be productive citizens and our economy grows, then we can increase our subsidy that we give to tertiary education so that more students can afford tertiary education,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Prime Minister, in commenting on two recently circulated videos of children being abused, described these as a “sad reflection of the society” and urged the students to be ambassadors of peace and agents of productivity.

“You are the inheritors of the new Jamaica, and you have to take a tough stance against violence in your school, in your peer groups, in your communities [and] in your household… both in terms of how you respond and how you influence your friends and peers to respond. I encourage you to be agents of productivity and ambassadors of peace.

“Now if you put the two things together, you will have what we call prosperity. We will have a prosperous country, a country in which everyone can feel that their dreams, hopes, aspirations and ambitions can be fulfilled,” Mr. Holness said.

He told the students that their dreams and aspirations can be fulfilled in Jamaica, pointing out that “nobody else from outside is going to come here and create that prosperous environment for us”.

“We have to create that prosperous environment for ourselves, and you are a very important part of that. Each and every one of you has that duty, that role to play in creating the prosperous Jamaica,” Prime Minister Holness said.