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Salient. Official Newspaper of the Victoria University Students' Association. Vol 41 No. 8. April 17 1978

Bill & Jenny

Bill & Jenny

Bill is a student at a large New Zealand university [unclear: h] be 21 in May and hopes to finish off his science degree this year. Coping with varsity work isn't too much [unclear: blem] for Bill; his biggest worry is knowing where the money's coming from to pay the landlord, buy food [unclear: n]flat and get some of the textbooks he couldn't afford earlier in the year.

At the end of last year Bill was flat broke. He [unclear: n] save about $1,000 over the summer holidays to supplement his bursary and cover his living and study [unclear: coit][unclear: rar]. But jobs were hard to get over the holidays. Bill end-ed up working for a local body under the government [unclear: idised] students community service programme and his total savings amounted to only $400. Now he's [unclear: loot], part-time employment to keep himself going.

It's not much consolation to Bill that he's a lot [unclear: be if] than his friend Jenny. She ended up registered as [unclear: unem] ployed for most of the holidays after the department that employed her in November suddenly gave her the sack right after Christmas. Jenny's got a [unclear: diffic] on in front of her now: to drop out of varsity and try and earn money working full-time or to go into debt and finish the law degree she started last year.

Not all students are in the same boat as Bill and Jenny. But their situation typifies that of thousands of university and technical institute students who have been caught up in the vicious spiral of inflation and unemployment.

In New Zealand it has always been accepted that students should work during their long summer holiday holidays and use their savings to supplement their bursaries. Students have liked this principle because it has meant that they've had the chance to get out of the universities and technical institutes and get to meet other people from different backgrounds, doing different types of jobs.

This system would work well if students' bursaries were adequate and if there were enough jobs to go round. At present the plain fact of the matter is that there's neither.

The Labour Government announced a new, standard tertiary bursary scheme for students at the end of May 1975, and set the level of the bursary at $24 a week (or $13 a week for students who did not have to live away from home to attend a university or a technical institute).

The Declining the Standard Tertiary Bursary

The Declining the Standard Tertiary Bursary

These rates were not increased until the beginning of this year when a $2 a week increase (announced in last year's budget) was applied. But between June 1975 and the end of 1977 inflation had eaten away at the purchasing power of the bursary and its real value page break had declined by 30.5% or almost one-third. The graph on this page shows how the bursary has steadily declined in value because of inflation.

The decline in the real value of the bursary by the end of 1977 meant that students would have to save more money over the summer to keep themselves going this year. But jobs were hard to come by for many students and unemployment was growing steadily. Despite the creation of over 2,500 jobs for students through the government-funded Student Community Service Programme, hundreds of students were unemployed. At the beginning of December last year, 1497 students were registered as unemployed or 4½ times the number of students registered at the same time in 1976.

Unless there is a real improvement in students' bursary rates a large number of students are either going to have to find part-time work (which will distract from their real job—studying), go substantially into debt or leave university or technical institutes. Any of these 'choices' will mean personal hardship for the students concerned and the risk that the investment that has been made in their education will be wasted

For the sake of our country's future. New Zealand cannot afford to waste the talents of its young people. That fact and the concern that most people feel for others who are hard-up are the reasons why the student case for better bursaries must be supported.