Congress gives teachers lots of homework
Congress gives teachers lots of homework
By Santi W.E. Soekanto
UJUNGPANDANG, South Sulawesi (JP): Education experts concluded their congress yesterday with a number of unfinished tasks, including the question of how to lobby the government to bolster education spending.
Participants at the third National Convention on Education called on the government to establish a foundation to raise funds in support of the nine-year compulsory education program in some of the lesser developed areas in eastern Indonesia.
"The program calls for more professional management and sufficient attention from relevant government officials, from the national level to the smallest villages," read a declaration issued at the end of the four-day congress.
"Public participation is key to the program's success. We need to mobilize the potential of the public and private sectors, wealthy members of society as well as the intellectual community to support the program."
The educators also called on the government to increase education spending.
Although education is one of the main priorities of government spending, the total amount spent represents a meager 0.6 percent of the gross domestic product.
"We are not going to ask the government to increase it to the same level as, say, Malaysia, because we understand Indonesia is different. It spans a very large area and its people are so diverse," said A. Suhaenah Suparno, one of the organizers. "But yes we'd like an increase to improve the education program."
Participants from all 27 provinces recommended a "redefinition of science of education" to accommodate rapid changes.
"The science of education needs to be enriched with elements from other sciences so that concepts can be translated into a praxis more relevant to present-day needs," Suhaenah told The Jakarta Post.
The declaration said religious values and the state ideology Pancasila should remain at the heart of the national education system.
"The teaching of Pancasila and religious and moral values should be done in a comprehensive manner to shape Indonesians who are modern and religious," the educators said.
On the quality of teachers, the congress said the existing teachers training institutes should be "expanded and strengthened" so they can produce graduates with greater academic and professional authority.
The dozens of recommendations as well as the declaration drawn up in the convention will be submitted to President Soeharto, the Ministry of Education and Culture, the House of Representatives and other policy makers.
"We will translate the concepts into workable plans and programs and submit them to relevant agencies and ask them to be implemented," Suhaenah said.
This was the third education convention, which is held every four years. The first was in 1988 in Bandung, the second in 1992 in Medan. The next will take place in Jakarta in 2000.
Earlier, during a discussion on innovation and technological developments, Toeti Soekamto of the Jakarta Teachers Training Institute (IKIP) said that the hundreds of studies conducted on the learning process over the past 20 years have yet to be applied in the classroom.
IKIP Jakarta alone did 250 studies on innovative teaching methods between 1980 and 1987. Yet, most schools still follow the teacher-centered tradition, she said.
"There's a gap between what's found in the costly studies and what's really going on in society," Toeti said.
"This conclusion lends credibility to the adage that universities are ivory towers separated from the community, and whose research doesn't affect the real world," she said.
Many researchers fail to disseminate their studies, the results of which are often not even understood or applied by teachers, she said.
She suggested that teachers join more training programs to become familiar with and able to apply the most effective teaching methods.