City of Cape Town Bursary

The City of Cape Town funds external bursaries for Cape Town residents studying scarce-skills qualifications at South African universities and TVET colleges. The municipality created the programme to build its own pipeline of qualified staff in areas where it consistently struggles to recruit, while also investing directly in the further education of residents from across the metro.

Because the bursary is meant for students who genuinely need financial support, the City excludes applicants who are already receiving other funding, including NSFAS - this bursary is aimed specifically at the gap those broader schemes don't cover.

The bursary covers registration, tuition, and examination fees, plus capped allowances for study materials, transport, and meals. It's designed to cover the core costs of completing your qualification rather than a broader living stipend.

You can study at any accredited South African university or TVET college, as long as you're a Cape Town resident and your qualification is on the City's current scarce-skills list. There's no separate restriction on which specific institutions qualify beyond that.