A total of 917 students have been admitted to the Seychelles Polytechnic and other post secondary educational institutions this year, but the figures are bound to increase by another 100 after the appeal board has considered other cases.

Again this year, the majority of students who have been selected are directly from S5 whilst provisions have also been made for S4 students who had opted to go straight into the eight training centres instead of continuing their studies in S5.

Altogether, some 1200 students applied for further studies at the different institutions and the overall percentage of them who would have been admitted after the appeal would represent a 15% increase on last year's record.

Students who have not been accepted in any institution and would like to lodge an appeal, can do so by reporting to the Career Guidance section in the Ministry of Education at Mont Fleuri next week. They will be given one week to do that.

The Industrial Training Centre (ITC) is recruiting the highest number of students with 289, followed by Polytechnic with 230, Seychelles Hospitality and Tourism Training Centre (SHTTC) with 181, National Institute for Health and Social Studies (NIHSS) with 69, National College of the Arts (NCA) with 49, National Institute of Education (NIE) with 41, Farmer's Training Centre (FTC) with 33 and Maritime Training Centre (MTC) with 25.

According to the director general for Education Planning, Mr Charles Confait, ITC, MTC and Polyechnic have all increased their quota compared to last year whereas some other institutions have reduced their intake.

The reason for this, he explained, depended on the demand of the different courses being offered as well as the requirements in the world of work. NIHSS for example has cut down on certain courses but is offering new ones, notably Emergency Care and Occupational Therapy.

However, despite the record number of students in all institutions, some of these are still under-quota and are hoping to gain more candidates after the appeal.

On the issue of gender, Mr Confait noted that this was generally balanced for the two sexes, with 485 boys being admitted and 432 girls. Evidently, the intake for tourism is dominated by female candidates whilst the fields of farming, maritime and industrial are led by male.

The other 100 students who are being given a second chance to win a seat in any of the institutions will not be selected in a direct process but their cases will be reviewed by the board of appeal.

Mr Confait explained that an appeal would not necessarily guarantee any student a seat if he or she did not satisfy the criteria for the course he/she was applying for.

He said the different criteria used in determining where to place the students into the various schools included not only the results of last year's examinations results but also the choice of the students themselves, their behaviour and attitude as well as their performance during interviews carried out by officials of the ministry.

Mr Confait advised students who wanted to appeal to be careful when making their choices and not to apply for courses in which they had not been accepted on first try.

The list of students who have been admitted in the various institutions is published in a supplement appearing in Saturday January 11,  Seychelles Weekend Nation and is also available on the ministry's website, http:www.education.gov.sc. as from Saturday January 11.

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