Use of SkillsFuture Credit for Younger ITE Graduates to Upgrade Themselves

Mr Saktiandi Supaat asked the Minister for Education whether ITE graduates under the age of 25 can be allowed to use their SkillsFuture credits to improve their skills or undertake courses to enhance their employability.

The Senior Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Education (Ms Low Yen Ling) (for the Minister for Education): The starting age for SkillsFuture Credit is 25 years old, as it is the age where many Singaporeans would have completed their full-time education and are in, or are preparing to join, or preparing to join, the workforce. Singaporeans under 25 years old can use their Post-Secondary Education Accounts (PSEAs) to defray out-of-pocket fees for approved programmes.

More importantly, beyond the SkillsFuture Credit, Singaporeans have access to a wide range of measures to support their skills development. There are subsidies of up to 97% of course fees for various training programmes, such as the part-time Higher Nitec module which could cost as low as $40, after all the subsidies.

ITE graduates who wish to enhance their employability or seek employment assistance, can receive help from the ITE Career Services Centre, or any of the Workforce Singapore career centres.

Mr Saktiandi Supaat (Bishan-Toa Payoh): Just one quick question: the age of 25, I suppose, it was introduced because it sort of meets with the graduation for most University graduates and tertiary education graduates. But for ITE graduates, when they graduate at 21, the Senior Parliamentary Secretary mentioned that there are Higher Nitec grants and subsidies that are provided. Will MOE consider to have some leeway for ITE students after they graduate, especially for those that have graduated and are trying to look for jobs, trying to utilise the SkillsFuture Credit immediately so that they can upskill themselves, going forward?

Ms Low Yen Ling: I thank Mr Saktiandi Supaat for his supplementary questions. I think I will highlight four key points to give him assurance that our ITE graduates will have the support to gain access to courses even after they graduate from ITE.

The first one is, they have a range of options they can choose from to gain access to courses to support skills development and also employability. I give a quick example, and that is the recently launched ITE Work-Learn Technical Diploma. This is essentially an apprenticeship-based programme that will allow our ITE graduates to pursue a diploma even as they work. It is designed to enhance our ITE graduates' employability because we have structured it such that it has a very strong, on-the-job component; 70% of the curriculum is based on on-the-job component. It really allows our ITE graduates, not just to learn and gain industry-relevant skills, but also to gain deep understanding of the company and also the sector.

I want to assure the Member that even after our ITE graduates leave ITE, maybe after taking Nitec and working for a couple of years and they are still young, they want to come back and take Nitec again or Higher Nitec, they will receive the support, heavily subsidised, and if their family is facing financial difficulties, we can work with them to look at how they can pay the course over a longer period of time through installments. So, that is the second key point.

The ITE graduates, if they are under the age of 25 years old, I briefly talked about the PSEAs. The average balances in the PSEAs are fairly substantial. I want to give assurance to Mr Saktiandi Supaat that they can use the funds available in the PSEAs and the PSEAs can be utilised for approved courses that is provided by a wide range of IHLs or even public agencies and also private training providers.

Mr Saktiandi Supaat: I thank the Senior Parliamentary Secretary. I just want to find out a bit more – are the PSEA's slew of curriculum courses similar to the SkillsFuture courses that have been provided or are they a smaller subset of the SkillsFuture range of courses?

Ms Low Yen Ling: The SkillsFuture Credit directory currently has about more 18,000 courses, modular, and they are quite short term. The approved courses under PSEA can range from a wide-ranging courses in our IHLs – that means our ITE, our Polytechnics, even AUs as well as public agencies and also private training providers – they are just as substantial as well.