Boosting education

Boosting education

I refer to the two headlines in the Sept. 23, 2000 edition of
The Jakarta Post: Education needs more attention on page 1, and
Holland provides $30.4 million grant for local schools, on page
2. This is supported by the demand for 25 percent of the state
budget to be allocated for education. We now find ourselves at a
turning point in the Indonesian way of thinking about education.

All these ideas should be put into effect by the government
and the people considering that Indonesia has a very big
population. If the government fails to do so, many negative
consequences are looming such as violence and disintegration,
mainly because of a lack of education and conscience.

Colin Rose and Malcolm J. Nicholl, in their famous book
Accelerated learning for the 21st Century (1977) have repeatedly
reminded us of the importance of training our brain as in the
following: The empires of the future will be the empires of the
mind (Churchill); if you want to develop your brain it needs to
be exercised constantly; one man that has a mind and knows it can
always beat ten men who haven't and don't (G. Bernard Shaw); a
mind that is stretched to a new idea never returns to its
original dimension (O.W. Holmes).

Further, brain storming or training is also related to health
as stated by Rose and Nicholl: Studies show that people with
higher education are generally healthier and live longer. Hence,
it is high time for the government to heed education as a
priority unless we want to be the slaves of the industrialized
countries.

ODO FADLOELI

Cimahi, Bandung