By RASHAD ROLLE

Tribune Staff Reporter

rrolle@tribunemedia.net

THE University of The Bahamas has enacted Prime Minister Dr Hubert Minnis' vision of paying rent to homeowners who accommodate university students in their homes, UB president Dr Rodney Smith said yesterday.

During his budget communication in June and during his speech at the Free National Movement's Torchbearers convention on Friday, Dr Minnis called on UB to establish a housing registry so the government could give homeowners in New Providence $500 for every Family Island student they accommodate.

Dr Smith said a meeting with senior UB administrators was called to materialise the PM's vision soon after he made his initial comments in the House of Assembly.

"We now have a form that people can go on our website and register their homes and we will come out and inspect their homes," he said. "We have certain criteria that must be met. The students or the students' parents will sign the lease agreement with the landlords and we will actually pay the landlords directly for those Family Island students."

Dr Smith spoke to reporters after he led the prime minister on a tour of UB during its opening day of classes for the semester.

Dr Minnis used the tour to highlight the government's Tertiary Grant Programme which expands free access to college education for Bahamian students by reducing the criteria for maintaining the grant. Students who receive a 2.0 grade point average can now get full financial coverage for their tuition and compulsory fees.

Dr Minnis met with students, many of whom are recipients of the grant.

"What was interesting," he told reporters after the tour, "was to see the amount of students taking advantage of the grant. In one particular class, all the students were taking advantage of it. Previously, many of the students were part-time but now most of the students are full-time meaning there were many students that could not afford it and they are more than happy and delighted that they've brought the GPA down giving everybody a chance. As I've said before, 'A' students do not make the leaders. Individuals that know they have certain deficits work very hard to overcome that deficit. You find that they are usually hard-working, go-getters who are very focused and in many instances those individuals are determined and they're the ones that become future leaders and CEOs in their communities because they're very, very focused and they don't take anything for granted."

Dr Smith said most of UB's students are grant recipients, though he could not say exactly how much. He said the grant has caused an uptick in the number of full-time students enrolled at the university.

"Most of our students used to be part time students," he said, "now it looks as if most of our students are going to be full-time students. Ninety to 95 percent of our incoming class, over 1,500 students, are full time students. We have seen an increase in enrollment in Grand Bahama and Nassau. If I were to estimate, we normally bring in about 1,200 freshmen for the year. This year we brought in more than 1,500 students and we're still counting. Our capacity for new students is 1,700."

Dr Smith also teased plans to expand UB's infrastructure. Soon, he said, the university will break ground to construct a new residential facility that will add 1,000 beds to the campus, create a five-level parking deck, a 500-seat cafeteria, retail facilities and additional classroom space. He said the plans have been in discussions now "for many years".