Julie Owens (Parramatta, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Small Business) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Last year, I met with an exceptionally bright group of students and their teacher, Larissa Mitchell, from Northmead Creative and Performing Arts High School. The concern of these students is that, as holders of temporary protection visas, they have no access to government funded university places and no capacity to pay. They are young people who desperately want to contribute to our society and, like students all over the world, they simply want an opportunity to improve their lives and the lives of their families and to see just what they are capable of.

Western Sydney University have stepped up. From this year, they are providing scholarships to refugee students on bridging visa Es and TPVs. In fact, I was thrilled to discover that one of the young women I met last year, 20-year-old Parastoo Bahrami, was accepted to Western Sydney University on one of these scholarships. She and her family fled Afghanistan and were in transit for 10 years as refugees. They arrived in Australia in 2012. Despite the fact that the family still live in visa uncertainty on bridging visas, Parastoo will study nursing in Western Sydney University's brand-new campus, which is across the street from my office in Parramatta CBD. These new scholarships will be provided at great financial cost to the university and will require extensive ongoing fundraising. I would like personally to thank all of the donors that have made these scholarships possible. The scholarships provide tuition fees for a three-year undergraduate degree and a bursary amount of up to $2,000 for books and materials. Thank you, Western Sydney University, for this trailblazing scholarship. You are doing a wonderful thing.