Funding your post-secondary education

Congratulations on completing your secondary education and embarking on the next stage of your academic journey! 

With this new chapter comes higher education costs. For Singapore citizens, an ITE Nitec course costs under $500 per academic year, while a polytechnic diploma course exceeds $3,000 each academic year. In comparison, secondary school fees cost about $300 annually.

If you’re wondering how to fund your further education, this TLDR question-and-answer guide will help you navigate the various loans and options available.

I’m going on to do a diploma course in polytechnic, and there’s a huge increase in the school fees. If my family isn’t able to pay my fees, what can I do?

You can take a loan to pay your fees, and you start repaying it only after you’ve graduated or left school.

For example, if you’re a Singaporean student taking a full-time polytechnic diploma course from academic year 2025, your subsidised annual tuition fee is $3,100. This fee you pay as a Singapore citizen is lower than that of international students.

So the tuition fee loan will cover 75 per cent of the amount, or about $2,325 per academic year.

It’s interest-free during the course of study. However, your loan starts incurring interest when you graduate or leave the institution. The interest rate is updated every six months and for the latest period from Oct 1, 2024 to March 31, 2025, it is 5 per cent per annum. You have 10 years to repay the loan.

For the other 25 per cent of the tuition fee, you will have to pay on your own or take an MOE Study Loan, for instance.

If you go on to an undergraduate course in an approved local university or education institute, the MOE Tuition Fee Loan can cover up to 90 per cent of subsidised tuition fees payable, and you have up to 20 years to repay the loan.

The loan is provided by MOE and is administered by the bank, which acts like a bookkeeper. Whenever payment is due for your course fees, the bank will record the portion of the fees covered by the loan. Full-time polytechnic diploma courses, for example, are billed on a semester basis.

For more information, check

https://www.moe.gov.sg/financial-matters/government-loan-schemes/tuition-fee-loan

You can also borrow money from your relatives’ or siblings’ CPF Ordinary Accounts. At the time of the application, you’re not required to show documents proving your relationship. But if there are audits, and you’re asked to provide these documents later, you have to do so.

The CPF Education Loan scheme will cover only full-time courses that are subsidised by the Ministry of Education (MOE) and conducted locally at approved educational institutions, which include all five polytechnics.

You start repaying your loan one year after graduating or leaving the course of study. You can pay everything in one lump sum or in monthly instalments up to 12 years. But you can’t use your own CPF savings to repay the loan.

Your loan starts incurring interest when it is drawn from the CPF, for example, in 2025 when you begin your studies. The interest rate will be the current CPF Ordinary Account interest rate of 2.5 per cent.

There are also restrictions on the proportion of money that can be withdrawn from CPF for the loan and on the proportion of tuition fees that can be paid using the CPF Education Loan.

The amount of money that can be used from the Ordinary Account for the education loan is 40 per cent of the accumulated Ordinary Account savings or the remaining Ordinary Account balance, depending on which is lower.

If you’re borrowing from a sibling’s CPF account, up to 100 per cent of your tuition fees can be paid from the loan. But if it’s from other relatives, the proportion of tuition fees that can be paid from the loan will be less, ranging from 10 per cent to 50 per cent, depending on the type of education institution. For more info,

see here

.

What is the better option?

It depends on how promptly you plan to pay back your loan. The CPF website states that if you intend to repay the loan promptly after graduation, the MOE Tuition Fee Loan “is a better option as it is interest-free during the course of study, unlike the CPF loan where interest starts to accrue from the time of withdrawal”. The website also gives a comparison of how this works out in

different scenarios

.

If I’ve already taken the maximum tuition fee loan and I still can’t afford to pay the remaining amount, what can I do?

If you’ve taken up the maximum tuition fee loan and your family has a gross monthly household per capita income of $2,700 or less (that’s the average monthly gross household income divided by the total number of household members), you can still apply for an MOE Study Loan.

For polytechnic, Lasalle or Nafa diploma students, the study loan covers up to 25 per cent of subsidised tuition fees payable and a living allowance loan of $2,000 per year.

The MOE Study Loan is also available if you go on to do MOE-subsidised undergraduate courses in future and need finance assistance. This subsequent study loan will cover up to 10 per cent of the subsidised Singapore Citizen tuition fees payable and a living allowance loan of $3,600 per year.

How about the repayment of the MOE Study Loan?

The study loan will be payable after you graduate or leave school. It is also means-tested, which affects whether you pay interest on your loan when you start the repayment.

Find out more about the loan and the eligibility criteria here:

https://www.moe.gov.sg/financial-matters/government-loan-schemes/study-loan

What about my Post-Secondary Education Account (PSEA)?

If you’re a Singapore citizen with a PSEA, you can apply to withdraw the funds for payment of fees and charges for approved institutions and programmes, including at polytechnics and ITE.

After you leave the institution, and if you still have funds in your PSEA, you can also use the money to pay the government education loans mentioned above. The funds can also be used to repay the CPF Education Loan.

Find out more information about using your PSEA here:

https://www.moe.gov.sg/financial-matters/psea/funds-balance-and-usage

I heard there are government bursaries. What about those?

Bursaries are monetary awards which provide financial assistance for lower to middle-income students. There are two government bursaries that can help you fund your post-secondary education.

If you are a Singaporean student with a gross household income (GHI) of $4,400 and below or gross monthly household per capita income (PCI) of $1,100 and below, you are eligible for the Higher Education Community Bursary which is managed by the Ministry of Education.

At its highest tier, the bursary covers 100 per cent of Nitec and Higher Nitec tuition fees, and approximately 95 per cent of diploma tuition fees.

The funds awarded are usually first used to offset existing tuition fees. Any remaining amount is then disbursed as cash.

The bursary is only for one academic year. If you need it again and qualify, you have to re-apply next year.

If you are a Singaporean student with a gross monthly household income (GHI) of $10,000 and below or gross monthly household per capita income (PCI) of $2,500 and below, you are eligible for the Higher Education Bursary, which is managed by MOE.

Bursary funds are usually used to offset existing tuition fees first. Any remaining amount is disbursed as cash.

The bursary lasts for only one academic year, and you will need to reapply should you need help for the next academic year.

Are there other bursaries I can apply for?

Many institutions offer bursaries sponsored by donors or private organisations. Singapore Polytechnic, for example, offers

more than 50 different donor-sponsored bursaries

that award between $1,000 to $5,000 per academic year.

These bursaries are often subject to donor-specific eligibility that may take into account factors such as nationality, course, academic performances and even co-curricular activities. Application for some institutions’ private bursaries may also be by

invitation-only

, such as at Republic Polytechnic.

If you are interested in private bursaries, check with your institution to see if you are eligible for any such programmes.

Self-help groups such as the Chinese Development Assistance Council, Yayasan Mendaki, Singapore Indian Development Association, and Eurasian Association also offer bursaries.

Can I have multiple bursaries concurrently?

You can only be on one government bursary at any one time. This means you should apply for the Higher Education Community Bursary for its higher quantum, rather than the Higher Education Bursary, should you meet its eligibility criteria.

As for private bursaries, check with your institution or the appropriate organisation about the terms and conditions stipulated for the award. Some institutions, like Republic Polytechnic for example, do not allow students to receive more than one non-government bursary at a time.

What about scholarships?

Many institutions and organisations also offer scholarships for students pursuing post-secondary education. Besides covering tuition fees, scholarships also often come with additional allowances that can be used to pay for additional learning resources, such as laptops or books.

Scholarships can be full-term (paying for your entire education) or mid-term (paying for part of your education). Some of these scholarships may also be bond-free, meaning that there are no post-study obligations imposed on the recipients. They may also come with internship and attachment opportunities, such as scholarships offered by the Defence Science and Technology Agency and PUB.

Check the terms and conditions of these scholarships carefully, as many are only eligible for certain courses, or do not allow you to concurrently hold bursaries or other scholarships. You can check on the eligible scholarships available at your institution in the box below.

Sources: Sources: MOE website, CPF website