180,000 youths not in school

180,000 youths not in school

JAKARTA (JP): A total of 187,212 youngsters aged between 15
and 21 did not attend school at all last year, an official has
said.

Bahar Laut, an official of the city's social and political
affairs directorate, said on Friday that the youngsters were
facing the same dilemma as 60,000 other poor children between
ages seven and 15.

"This means that there are at least 247,200 youngsters and
kids here who do not study in a school because they are too
poor," Bahar said, urging the city administration to pay more
attention to their fate.

Parents of the 60,000 children cannot afford send them to
school.

"They feel that once kids finish elementary school, they want
to go to senior high school and then on to college," Bahar said.

"When parents don't have money, they will not allow their
children to even dream of school... so they tell them to forget
about it."

City councilor Agus Waluyo also said that aside from 8,156
schoolchildren who dropped out of school this year due to the
economic crisis, it was feared another 87,570 would follow suit
in the near future.

Agus, quoting data from the Ministry of Education and Culture,
said that out of the 87,570 students feared to drop out, 35,265
would be elementary schoolchildren, 29,605 would be from junior
high school and 22,700 from senior high school. (ylt)