Rotorua's older students face cuts

Rotorua's Mary Wood finds being able to study as a mature student a privilege - but it's something others may soon find harder to do.
The Government announced yesterday that funding for tertiary education would be cut in Thursday's Budget.
Savings will come from tightening eligibility for student loans for students over 55 and imposing restrictions on borrowing for people who already owed money to the loan scheme.
Last year, the Government paid $1.5 billion in student loans and recovered about half that.
In the new budget they wanted to ensure people borrowing for studies were likely to find work that would give them enough income to repay their loans.
Older students may miss out on borrowing for living costs, which could save about $10 million a year.
Mrs Wood - a Waiariki Institute of Technology student in her 50s - was in her third year of a Diploma in Nursing.
She said she considered it a privilege to have been able to study as a mature student.
"We are lucky to be able to do that in New Zealand."
She said while she could understand the Government's point of view, the new restrictions were discriminating against mature students.
Mrs Wood said she had contemplated nursing most of her life and finally decided to do it because she wanted to give back.
"I don't want to sit back and do nothing in my retirement."
Mrs Wood will graduate at the end of the year and was confident she would find work.
"I believe I have plenty of working years left in me."
She planned to pay back her loan when she finished studying.
Waiariki's student association WITSA president Mike Kapita said the new rules would create a huge disadvantage for the high number of mature students who studied full time at Waiariki.
Mr Kapita said mature students should get the same loan entitlements as younger students.
He also said restricting access to loans to students who already owed money to the scheme was a little unfair. "The Government needs to ensure they look at it on a case-by-case basis."
He said they needed to look carefully at why a student might not have paid back their loan.
Mr Kapita said they needed to look at how a student performed during their courses and not just how much they owed.
The Government expects its changes to save several hundred million dollars over four years.
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Restrictions
- Barring students over 55 from borrowing for living costs. That could save about $10 million a year.
- Tightening borrowing restrictions for pilot trainees, who borrow $30 million a year, 60 per cent of which is written off.
- New restrictions on borrowers who owe money from previous studies.
- These and other moves are expected to improve the recovery rate on student loans from 43c in the dollar to 47c.
Based on current annual lending, that could save more than $60 million a year.