MEDICAL SCHOOL BURSARIES

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 70, Issue 128, 15 March 1950, Page 4

MEDICAL SCHOOL BURSARIES

SEVENTEEN REFUSED THIS YEAR MINISTER’S EXPLANATION (P.A.) DUNEDIN, March 14. Seventeen of 36 second-year medical students at the Otago Medical School who applied this year for bursaries have been refused this assistance. According to a spokesman, some or all of these will have to drop their courses. It was stated to-night that in the past these’ bursaries, amounting to £llO a year, had been paid without exception. The Minister of Health, Mr J. T. Watts, said to-night in Wellington that owing to changed conditions the number of bursaries granted for 1950 was reduced. Bursaries were awarded from 1943 with the object of encouraging medical students to the University of Otago, with the object of overcoming a possible shortage of doctors, during and after the war.

There was now no shortage, and although a better distribution in different parts was desirable, it was considered that in future the number of? bursars, as far as possible, should be reduced by making awards only to students of the highest intellectual qualifications, with character and personality most suited for the medical profession. Naturally, the selection of bursars with these high qualications was not easy, and in the selection this year he had arranged for a special committee of two Health Department medical officers and an officer of the Education Department with special experience in bursary problems. This committee ha'd selected this year’s bursars, and it was proposed that it select future bursars, on a policy to be approved by Cabinet. Decisions and recommendations of the committee would be final, and not subject to political direction in any way.

The selection of the best bursars might require the personal appearance of applicants before the committee, and it was likely that this procedure would be adopted in future.