The National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) provides comprehensive funding to students enrolled in academic programmes at public universities and Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) Colleges.
Students from poor and working-class backgrounds rely on NSFAS funding to cover the costs associated with their studies. NSFAS will pay a student's tuition fees and provide them with a learning material allowance, a living allowance and an accommodation allowance.
It's always useful to know which documents are needed when applying for a bursary. These documents serve to support a student's application for funding.
Many students will find they don't need all of these documents when they first apply. From 2023 the application process is simpler and not all of these documents are needed when you first apply. The best thing to do is to start the application process and then see what you are asked for.
Here Are The Documents Needed For NSFAS Applications
- A copy of the student's ID or birth certificate.
- ID copies of parents, guardian or spouse (or death certificate where applicable).
- Marriage certificate (where applicable).
- Your proof of income or 1 year’s IRP5 (if applicable).
- Your parents, guardian or spouse’s proof of income (if you are a Sassa grant recipient, no proof of income is required)
- Applicants with a disability must submit a completed and signed Disability Annexure A Form
Is An Affidavit Needed When Applying For NSFAS?
An affidavit is not required when submitting a bursary application to NSFAS.
In the 2023 NSFAS Final Eligibility Criteria and Conditions, the financial aid scheme revealed its new policy for the Disallowance of affidavits for legal guardians' information.
NSFAS Requires Court Order For Guardianship
They explained that they detected an increased number of students incorrectly being approved for funding from Nsfas by misrepresenting their parental information.
Only accept legal guardianship for an applicant where the guardian is appointed by a court. Affidavits declaring that a guardian is an applicant’s legal guardian will no longer be accepted
Nsfas acknowledged that securing a court appointment can take a substantial amount of time, so they introduced a declaration form which must be completed as part of the application process.
Nsfas reserves the right to reject supporting evidence based on affidavits
More than one million students applied for Nsfas funding for the 2023 academic year. These students will receive increased allowances for the current academic year.
