6.20 It is understood that the colleges may wish to run one-year courses for those students completing the two-year post-Form VI courses who have demonstrated the ability to proceed to a higher award. This is agreed on the understanding that such courses will attract no further financial assistance from the Government. The Government will be prepared to recognise the students who complete the courses satisfactorily as having the same eligibility and entitlements upon entry to Government service as would be granted to students at the Polytechnic who had studied one year beyond the Higher Diploma level, provided that it is established by independent assessment that the courses had reached this standard.
6.21 Fee remission arrangements for students on the courses at the sixth-form level will be a matter for the colleges. Students on the two-year post-Form VI courses will be eligible to apply for grants and loans on similar terms as students at the colleges of education. A loan scheme on more generous terms than that already available is proposed for needy students on the further one-year courses. This improved loan scheme may be offered also to existing students at the colleges, with effect from September 1979. It would be for the colleges to provide from their private resources any further support required by students.
6.22 Student numbers on these courses will be limited to what is necessary to meet approved development targets for the public sector and to what the colleges' present capacity can accommodate without overcrowding. It is not intended to expand the total number of students presently at the colleges, nor to extend this scheme to any colleges other than those which have already been approved under the Post Secondary Colleges Ordinance.
6.23 The scheme being offered to the colleges will enable them to contribute towards the Government's targets for sixth-form and tertiary education, in return for financial assistance for them and their students, while retaining the status of private institutions with a considerable measure of freedom over curriculum and syllabuses. It will enable the awards offered by the colleges to be aligned with those provided in other institutions.
6.24 The Post Secondary Colleges Ordinance will be amended to reflect the new role for the colleges described in this White Paper. Each college will have the option of retaining its present form, with the existing range of courses and awards; if it so elects, there would be no direct financial assistance to the college, though the Government would make available a student loan scheme. Alternatively, the college may choose to accept Government financial support in accor- dance with the arrangements described in this chapter, which are proposed to take effect from September 1979. The Government's financial responsibilities under this scheme, including the management of the student finance scheme, will be discharged through the Education Department. A scheme of control will be drawn up and the colleges will be required to submit to the Education Department annual statements of income and proposed expenditure and audited accounts showing that the terms of the scheme had been complied with.
6.25 The programmes described in the Green Paper would have provided opportunities for 33% of the population in the relevant age-group to receive a subsidised course of tertiary education by 1986, compared with 18% in 1977. Under the proposals in this White Paper, these opportunities will be increased further, in particular through the expansion of technician courses in technical institutes and the introduction of subsidised courses at approved post-secondary colleges.
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