[busyness53]

parents to start saving now for their childrens university.
look at it this way my grandson is 7yr, by the time he goes to uni,
if i put away $20.00wkly, in 1yr he will have $1040.00, in 8yrs it will be $8320.00. add the gov. $1000.00 =$9320.00
I wonder if inflation will remain the same as now.

[ICE]

How much does it cost to go to Uni in NZ?

[Sparklechick]

It depends on what you are wanting to do. One of my friends has a student loan of $30,000 because she is studying medicine. She's never going to be able to pay that back so will probably move overseas to work.

Like someone on the news said, it's all very good to set something like this up, but isn't education what our tax dollars should be going toward and what about those people already struggling on the income they are on? Are their salaries going to be increased so they can afford to put money away each week for education? Unlikely.

[kall]

This kind of thing already exists, has done since 1974 (if my memory serves me).

It's called the Australian Scholarships Group...it started in Aussie, but in the late 80s, started up here too.

Effectively, what you do is: Enrol your child when they are young and contribute a small amount of money each month (or year, or whatever), and because there are so many people in the pool you are in (those other kids who are the same age at enrolment as your child), the money can be invested better than if it was just you drip-feeding it.

All the money that is contributed for a child goes into a pool that includes all the children who were enrolled at the same age and in the same year as yours.

At the end of it all (when your child goes to Secondary School for the younger programme, or Uni for the older one), you get back all your money (minus only $80) and if your child is eligible to receive the scholarship, he/she gets an equal share of the money from the pool.

The idea is to encourage the kids to go on to an eligible course and continue to pass, as their 'free money' is dependent on them passing.

All up, a marvellous scheme. Not for profit...all for Education.

Call them. If you have a child under the age of 5, it's very worth it. (If they are older han 5, theycan still be enrolled up to age 7, but the contributions are higher to make up for the fact that you havent been contributiong to that point.)