Minister of Higher Education, Blade Nzimande, announced that NSFAS will not be taking late applications from students wanting to be funded for the 2024 academic year.
Minister of Higher Education, Blade Nzimande, announced that the National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) will not be taking late applications from students wanting to be funded for the 2024 academic year.
During his briefing, he made it clear saying:
Given the high numbers of applications received for NSFAS, funding late applications will not be accepted in 2024.
NSFAS received around 750 000 applications from students wanting to be funded in 2024. This is an increase of 185 000 applications when compared to 2021.
This, the Minister said, “shows a high level of demand for funding support and access to higher education and training opportunities”.
Students are given a specific time to accept the space offered to them at universities and are urged to do so. This would also affect whether they are funded by NSFAS or not.
“Each university and TVET college has an enrolment plan and can only admit a specific number of students. The competition for such spaces is high, especially in universities,” said Nzimande.
61% of these applicants are SASSA beneficiaries, amounting to over 460 000.
NSFAS embarked on assessing these applications in December and is still in the process of doing so, aiming to complete the evaluation process in February. This is so that students can know whether they’ve been funded or not when registration begins.
NSFAS provides fully subsidised free higher education and training for poor and working-class South Africans. NSFAS will cover your tuition fees, accommodation fees as well as give you transport, living and book allowances to make sure that your higher education is covered far beyond what you expect.
If you’ve applied to be funded through NSFAS but you haven’t received any word on whether you’ve been approved for NSFAS yet, it will be communicated soon but you can check your application status by logging into your myNSFAS account and track your application progress. Here you will receive more information on which stage your application is at.
NSFAS Applications for 2024 will open in August/September.
False. NSFAS isn’t even opened for 2022 applications yet.