Trinidad and Tobago taxpayers invested more than two billion dollars over the past six years in educating students pursuing undergraduate studies and distance learning at the tertiary level.That's the amount the Manning administration spent on GATE - the Government Assistance for Tuition Expenses from October 2004 to June 2010.
The exact amount - $2,366,250,320 - went to pay for 253,018 tertiary level students.
The largest allocation was between October 2006 and September 2007, when 56,056 students received grants amounting to $4.7 million. Between October 2009 and June 24, 2010, the tertiary education ministry allocated $5.4 million to 47,000 applicants.
Tertiary Education Minister Fazal Karim anticipates that the investment in GATE will increase since the new People's Partnership government has pledged to expand the education program.
Karim told the Trinidad Guardian GATE will form the "overall strategy for human development, economic diversification and competitiveness".
He said, "We are going to do this in terms of the capacity of training providers to deliver programmes that are responsive to the labour market needs and the economy."
Karim recently held a meeting with officials of the Polytechnic Institute of New York University who expressed an interest in offering students scholarships.
"We also spoke about a student exchange on both sides and a study tour for students from Trinidad and Tobago to universities in the United States," he said.
Karim also met with members of State University of New York (SUNY), which is a workforce development and technology centre, to have a hands-on view of vocational training for T&T citizens working in the industry and, as well, for full time students.
"We had discussions on how we can collaborate with SUNY, UWI, UTT and COSTAATT," he said.
Karim said officials of SUNY, Suffolk County Community College and Polytechnic Institute intend to visit Trinidad and Tobago by the end of the year for discussions on areas of cooperation and collaboration.
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