A fund was launched by the University of Malta to help students struggling to get basic and essential needs in the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Student Solidarity Fund aims to provide “first-hand instant and interim relief” for students suffering financially. It could be for a number of reasons, including loss of earnings due to business closures, self-isolation or sickness.

Although set up in response to the pandemic, the fund will continue to assist students after the crisis ends.

It consists of donations from members of the academic, administrative and technical staff from the University of Malta and students.

Eligible students are guided by a social worker from the university to apply for existing state support, including the supplementary stipend offered by the Ministry of Education, and are assisted until more permanent solutions are found.

Students, including those who work while studying, were left out of the state’s COVID-19 wage supplement on the basis that they receive a monthly stipend of €80.

Industries that suffered due to the pandemic were eligible to have their employee costs covered. Under the scheme, full-time employees receive €800 a month, whilst part-timers receive €500.

This has been a sour point for students, with 22-year-old bar owner Estelle Degiorgio criticising their exclusion from state aid. Degiorgio, who owns Valletta bar Beer Cave, says most of her staff have yet to complete their studies and are suffering without any compensation.

“Personally, I was lucky that I took a break from studying to pursue my dream of opening a bar because if I received stipend I would also have not been eligible for this aid,” she said.

Degiorgio tries to help her staff by creating odd jobs and errands for them to do, but with her bar struggling financially, she fears she won’t be able to pay them for much longer.

“Students work because they need the money and because they cannot live on their stipend alone. If this pandemic lasts longer, we will have had to face the inevitable – Maltese youths would have ended up homeless or bunking with their friends because not everyone is lucky enough to have parents that are well off.”

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