In regard to the eventual amendment to the School Welfare scheme (ASE), the Regional Secretary for Education and Culture stated today the Government of the Azores "is aware" to this issue and is "mitigating the social and economic problems" the Azoreans are facing.
 
Speaking at the end of a meeting with the Committee on Social Affairs of the Legislative Assembly, Avelino Meneses said that the ASE "is not synonymous with social solidarity, it is something that only works within the Regional Education System in order to provide all students with the same opportunities or at least with very similar opportunities."

In the school year 2015/2016, with a total 25,684 School Welfare beneficiaries, there were "only eight complaints" submitted to the Regional Secretariat for Education and Culture. According to Avelino Meneses, "the figure is far more than residual." This means that "the Azoreans are, at least, at peace with their School Welfare scheme."

However, Avelino Meneses assured that the Regional Secretariat for Education and Culture "is not idle." In this context, the government official restated that, as he had already said during a visit to a secondary school on Terceira Island in September 2015, the Government is working towards to a possible amendment of the scheme in force; however "it is not an absolute priority."
 
"In terms of a future revision of the School Welfare scheme in the Azores, we basically have three goals," the government official said, adding that "we need to standardise legislation insofar as ASE is currently ruled by scattered legislation, which includes the old Student Statute dating back from 2007 and the 2012 legislation on textbooks," said the government official.

According to the Regional Secretary, the ASE aims "to provide opportunities to those who have fewer opportunities" so that "no student has to give up studying due to social or economic reasons." Besides this goal, we must "add the goal of building an increasingly better society with committed citizens and rewarding, as much as possible, their merit."

The Regional Secretary for Education and Culture also stated that the Government is considering the possibility of attaching the support allocated under ASE to family allowance benefits instead of the Personal Income Tax, if we "effectively reach to the conclusion that this measure will bring more rigour and transparency to the system."

As for preschool education on Corvo, Avelino Meneses considered that the response to the needs of the population is "suited and has quality," stressing that it will soon reinforced with the expansion of the day care and kindergarten facilities in a partnership between the Regional Government and "Santa Casa da Misericórdia."