Bright future beckons for today's students

Despite the worldwide economic crunch, Malta is still attracting local and foreign investments by entrepreneurs that consider the present situation as appropriate to increase their business potential.

Thanks to the wisdom of our administrators and the highly efficient banking system, we are facing the present challenges with comparative success. The recently announced details given by SR Technics and Island Hotels Group are highly encouraging examples. The latter are investing €50 million which will eventually mean an additional 200 jobs.

The creation of new and better jobs may be regarded as the government's mission statement. Employment has always been considered as a priority. The regular increases in employment figures prove most encouraging despite obvious difficulties mainly stemming from the international situation.

The laurels must surely go to the government for aiding companies which were facing difficulties in order to save thousands of jobs while creating possibilities for expansion.

The policies that are being adopted in education are attracting thousands of youngsters to continue with their studies. The stipends lessen financial worries for them and their parents.

A very high percentage are determined to carry on with their tertiary education. They rightly believe that to succeed they have to be qualified. Today's students are also given possibilities to further their studies abroad while a good number of scholarships are regularly being offered.

Not everyone is gifted to follow courses at the University or Mcast; thus the introduction of training programmes by the ETC for those who are not studying and presently unemployed is certainly commendable.

Students are being encouraged to be creative and innovative. They are being given possibilities which are not necessarily found in other countries. There seems to be a bright future for today's generation of students. It is up to us students to take full advantage of these possibilities.