Pretoria - Students in need of money to finance their studies have taken a different approach this year.
They have set up a campaign on BackaBuddy and appealed for crowdfunding to finance their next step of the academic journey. The students took to the online platform, shared their story and the amount they needed for this academic year.
Among them are University of Pretoria's Randy Seda, 21, a B.Com Accounting Science student.
Seda wrote on his campaign that because he was an international student, obtaining bursaries, grants and scholarships were very hard since the prerequisite was that one must be a South African citizen.
“In 2017 my mother had a stroke that caused a loss of speech and temporary paralysis of the right-hand side of her body.
“This meant she couldn't work as she had to recover and that led to me starting a crowdfunding page and we managed to raise R180 000 to clear my historical debt,” he said.
Last year, he was able to study, but had to work part-time doing numerous jobs to cover transport and basic living expenses as well as helping financially at home.
He said: “This caused a lot of strain on my academics as I had to spend a certain part of my attention on work and away from school.
“All my attempts to find funding for the year were unsuccessful and my balance for the year was increasing.”
Seda said crowdfunding was his last resort, and he needed to raise a total of R137000. Thus far, Seda has raised R12913 which will be paid directly to the university by BackaBuddy.
BackaBuddy chef executive Catherine du Plooy said: “Crowdfunding is always an attractive alternative for students hoping to study without incurring debt, but one of the biggest concerns in the donor community is always the question of where generated funds will be used.
“For this reason we offer the option to manage funds for our campaign creators and pay universities and other relevant intuitions directly to ensure donor peace of mind when supporting students.”