Who should be educating a better generation?<\/p>\n
By Arkiman Racheman<\/p>\n
MEDAN (JP): In a recent meeting with state Islamic school
\nteachers in Yogyakarta, Minister of Religious Affairs A. Malik
\nFadjar asserted that a tremendous crisis was hitting the
\neducational system in Indonesia (Kompas, Nov. 1, 1999).<\/p>\n
He identified the primary cause as the shrinking number of
\nguru (Indonesian for \"teacher\"), as opposed to pengajar
\n(literally \"anyone who teaches\"), in our secondary schools.<\/p>\n
According to Malik Fadjar, guru are special people who
\nsupposedly set exemplary examples in conduct and morality for
\ntheir students. Their shortage and the lack of their good
\nexamples for others to follow have seemingly led our nation into
\ncrisis.<\/p>\n
If this educational anomaly is not seriously addressed, the
\nminister continued, it would be difficult to materialize \"a well-
\nmannered and religious society\" in the future. And it is well
\nunderstood that to make it possible for the desired civil society
\nto occur, the supply of a new Indonesian breed is beyond any
\ndoubt.<\/p>\n
Semantically speaking, the word guru is not the same as just a
\npengajar. The latter has a much narrower or more specific nuance
\nof meaning. People \"teaching\" anything at all, even though they
\nmay not be up to the required minimum level of qualification
\nneeded for that purpose, can be simply referred to as pengajar.<\/p>\n
Ironically, they can at times be found \"teaching their
\nstudents a lesson\" in the sense that they still physically punish
\nthem as a necessary part of the commonly practiced disciplinary
\nsystem in most Indonesian schools.<\/p>\n
Implications of the word guru are entirely different from any
\nof the implied notions mentioned above. They are often culturally
\nconstrued (also by the minister himself) as specialists who will,
\nby their noble nature, impart every bit of their essential
\nknowledge, both profane and divine, including that of social
\netiquette and morality, to their students.<\/p>\n
It is not so surprising, therefore, that even in the modern
\nEnglish dictionary the word \"guru\" is still maintained and used,
\nbut in the original sense of \"a spiritual teacher or leader\",
\nhence, a person who provides spiritual guidance or direction to
\nfollowers.<\/p>\n
It is possible this interesting semantic differentiation
\nbetween the two words may well have been responsible in the first
\nplace for the way the words are now being differently treated in
\nour language. That is to say, pengajar being so readily accepted
\nas an antonym for guru. Would it be reasonable to say that this
\nreality may have also paved the way for coinage of the expression
\n\"Hari Guru Nasional\" and rejection of \"Hari Pengajar Nasional\",
\nboth meaning National Teachers Day?<\/p>\n
It can be said here that the word pengajar, when it is
\njuxtaposed with guru, almost always implies things in the
\nnegative, while the word guru, on the contrary, has only positive
\nconnotations. But there could be different implications suggested
\nby the words.<\/p>\n
First of all, within the present climate of severely
\ncommercialized education, pengajar are often imagined as sheer
\n\"employees\" who operate and keep the educational \"company\"
\nrolling, whereas guru are increasingly left behind in the view of
\nidealistic creatures incapable of surviving the hurly-burly of
\nmodern materialism.<\/p>\n
While pengajar are frequently busied by their own obsession
\nwith the tantalizing material world, guru are more deeply engaged
\nin their focused devotion for the pupils in order that they grow
\nand mature emotionally, intellectually and spiritually.<\/p>\n
Philosophically speaking, guru and pengajar in principle
\ndiffer from one another, especially when viewed from the kind of
\nsubstance they hand down to their students. Guru, most of the
\ntime, impart the whole of their knowledge in its totality; while
\npengajar, for one reason or another, may only offer a fragmented
\nbody of knowledge.<\/p>\n
Good guru have no justified fear of being potentially subdued
\nor troubled by their smart students, but pengajar, even the best,
\nwould at times worry about having to deal with their brilliant
\nstudents, who are customarily the most \"hassling\" and, for that
\nmatter, the most time-consuming as well.<\/p>\n
Therefore, guru lead and act by example, while pengajar
\ntransmit their synthesis of knowledge as something detached from
\ntheir real life altogether. In other words, the former must be
\nable to prove and apply their own teachings empirically even
\noutside the context of their own professional formalism. The
\nlatter are conditioned merely as a cold extended hand for the
\nobjective source of knowledge.<\/p>\n
That is the reason why few people could become guru on the
\nbasis of their formal teaching qualifications alone. And, within
\nthis connection, it can be said as well that no single teachers'
\ntraining institute in the country would be capable of \"producing\"
\nsuch in-demand guru either. Therefore, ideal guru should already
\nhave contained those lofty qualities in themselves far
\nbeforehand, or they can never be ones at all.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, if need be, the number of pengajar can always be
\nmultiplied quantitatively, even in a fortnight or so, by means of
\na certain training package carried out in conduction with the
\ngovernment's educational policy on procedural uniformity.<\/p>\n
Therefore, unlike pengajar, guru must be \"the chosen ones\" and
\nnot \"those who choose\" to be ones. Like a divinely appointed
\nprophet, guru must be selected from the entire human race in
\norder to carry out a special prophetic mission.<\/p>\n
In implementing their missionary work, guru commit themselves
\nonly to their deeply felt conscience and their own spiritual
\nconsciousness, while pengajar would go only as far as fulfilling
\nthe task of their profane commitment.<\/p>\n
Consequently, guru feel a deeper and more direct
\nresponsibility for their students' acquired competence as well as
\ntheir failure. Pengajar, on the other hand, are not always
\nwilling to attach themselves to such a mode of self-sacrificial
\ncommitment.<\/p>\n
In the system of conduct, the former gratefully allow their
\nown profession to mold for themselves a particular binding
\nlifestyle, but the latter only view their profession as a part-
\ntime social or, worse still, commercial self-involvement.<\/p>\n
To put it in different words, guru will always act as ones
\neven when they are not carrying out their professional function;
\nwhile pengajar are easily and, at times, consciously swept along
\ninto the current of their social life.<\/p>\n
It is not hard to imagine, therefore, that the guru of that
\nsort will always be the minority in the countries like Indonesia
\nwhere sole economic concerns predominate, but pengajar constitute
\nthe domineering majority in an increasingly consumerism culture.
\nThe reason for that is manifold.<\/p>\n
First, it is easier to make the latter available in large
\nnumbers. They are everywhere and, for that matter, are easier to
\nlocate, but guru are increasingly difficult to find nowadays in
\nthis ever-despiritualizing society of ours due to their natural
\nscarcity.<\/p>\n
Second, it is presumably cheaper for the government to produce
\nthe pengajar rather than guru in \"industrialized\" educational
\nprojects which often emphasize radically intensive indoctrination
\nsyllabi. In practice, these professionals of relatively minimal
\nquality standards are siap ditempatkan (ready for allocation) in
\nindustrial posts rather than highly qualified gurus who are siap
\npakai (ready for use) in all fields of employment.<\/p>\n
Finally, it would not seem a serious problem to sacrifice the
\npengajar's scanty idealism than guru's deep-rooted personal
\nintegrity. So much so that the pengajar would not consciously
\nreject being used by their money-gapping institution as a cheap
\nsource of labor. The guru is considerably harder to persuade,
\nbecause for them, as always, \"it is far better to starve than to
\nprostitute\" their sense of honor.<\/p>\n
To return to the religious affairs minister's concern, we ask:
\nHas the shortage of guru in our secondary schools really caused
\nsuch a tremendous crisis? Such irreparable damage?<\/p>\n
If that is the case, then there is no doubt that our nation is
\nnow on the verge of total moral collapse. Why? Because the older
\ngeneration of people (read: the leftovers of the previous regime)
\nwho have, unfortunately, fallen into disgrace due to their past
\nmoral decadence cannot be expected to play a positive role any
\nlonger.<\/p>\n
Habibie's transitional government, in the mean time, is far
\ntoo busy feeding the hungry nation to have time to recognize any
\nlong-term ideals. Meanwhile, a totally corrective new generation
\nof breed only exists in everyone's imagination, as it has not
\nactually shown any sign of imminence in actuality.<\/p>\n
However, if the present condition is still within reach, would
\nit not be right for the present powerholders and decisionmakers
\nof the country to first of all lament over the worsening crisis
\nin our education system, and soon afterward do something
\nsubstantial about it before it is too late?<\/p>\n
At any rate, to establish a truly civilized New Indonesian
\nsociety, the urgency of which is voiced through thousands of
\nReformasi microphones, without concrete support in the form of an
\nemerging new generation of Indonesians who are \"well-behaved and
\nreligious\" would be a mission impossible. And to hope for a whole
\nnew bunch of civilized Indonesians to appear \"out of the blue\",
\nbut without the ceaseless labor of genuine guru, would be an
\nabsurdity.<\/p>\n
The writer is a New Zealand university graduate and English
\nlecturer. He is based in Medan.<\/p>",
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