About 700 students will miss out on summer holiday research jobs this year because the Government has decided not to repeat a $4 million grant it gave the universities last summer.
Tertiary Education Commission investment director David Nicholson said the grant was "a one-off targeted initiative" that would not be
repeated.
This is despite the fact that unemployment has risen from 5.9 per cent in June last year to 6.8 per cent at last count this June, although the Reserve Bank expects it to drop to 6 per cent over the summer compared with 7.1 per cent last December.
The $4 million Government grant last summer was matched by $4 million from the universities to fund a total of 1600 $5000 research scholarships.
Auckland University vice-chancellor Stuart McCutcheon said universities which already had summer research scholarships would continue with them despite the loss of Government funding. Auckland would fund about 500 scholarships this summer, compared with 450 funded internally and 200 funded by the Government grant last summer.
Those figures suggest the overall reduction across the country's eight universities may be from 1600 to about 1100.
Professor McCutcheon said the universities gave the Government data showing last year's grant was a success, with the vast majority of scholarship winners continuing their studies this year.
"The Government was of the view that it wants to put its investment elsewhere," he said.
The Government gave Student Job Search an extra $750,000 to market its service to employers last summer.
A spokeswoman for Social Development Minister Paula Bennett said this summer's funding for the service was still under consideration.
