A group of Northern Marianas College students who have not received their scholarship checks protested outside the Pedro P. Tenorio Multi-Purpose Hall last Friday during Gov. Benigno R. Fitial\u2019s State of the Commonwealth Address.<\/p>\n
At least 10 NMC students stood under the scorching sun waiting for the SOCA to end. They waved placards that read, \u201cTo make a difference you need a strong mind!\u201d and \u201cWhat happens to \u2018education is important?,\u2019\u201d among others.<\/p>\n
The students said the CNMI Scholarship Office and the Saipan Higher Education Financial Assistance have not released their checks yet and they are at a loss as to when they will finally get them.<\/p>\n
\u201cNobody is giving us real information,\u201d said Chang Torres, who led the group. <\/p>\n
The students later talked to Finance Secretary Eloy Inos who tried to pacify the group.<\/p>\n
Torres told Inos that her group represents over 120 NMC students currently enrolled on the college\u2019s Saipan campus who have not received their scholarship checks since January this year.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur semester is ending on May 6,\u201d said Torres, adding that the local government has not been telling them about the actual situation. <\/p>\n
Torres said she has been talking with the CNMI Scholarship Office but they have failed to give them any answers. She added that when students followed up their checks with the office clerks, they would always tell the students to speak directly with Inos. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe government should inform the students that there is no funding so that we would not hope for a good education anymore,\u201d said the students.<\/p>\n
Torres, a third year Education Program student and a teacher at Childhood Development in Koblerville, said some students break their backs and go the extra mile just to obtain higher learning, yet every year they always have difficulty getting their checks. \u201cIt even gets worse every year.\u201d<\/p>\n
As a scholar, Torres is due to receive at least $2,100 for this semester. Although the college still allows them to report to class, she said the delay has been affecting them in school, especially when they are required to purchase school materials. \u201cWe couldn\u2019t buy books and keep up with the curriculum,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Consequently, students would opt to either drop the class or incur an Incomplete grade. <\/p>\n
Torres said their education has been extremely affected. \u201cAs scholars we have to maintain our GPA [grade point average] to maintain our scholarships,\u201d she said. However, if students either fail or don\u2019t complete the subjects, they eventually lose their scholarships.<\/p>\n
Inos assured the protesters that his office would look into their claims immediately, though he also told them that the CNMI right now doesn\u2019t have money. He assured the protesters that he would help them. He also took the contact numbers of the students.<\/p>\n
Torres, together with more than 50 NMC students, also attended the SOCA inside the Multi-Purpose Hall. She expressed shock when the governor said he would not talk about education. <\/p>\n
“He didn’t even touch on it,” she said, shaking her head. <\/p>\n
She said this made the students feel “unimportant.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A group of Northern Marianas College students who have not received their scholarship checks protested outside the Pedro P. Tenorio Multi-Purpose Hall last Friday during Gov. Benigno R. Fitial\u2019s State of the Commonwealth Address.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-100073","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100073","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=100073"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100073\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=100073"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=100073"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=100073"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}