Corruption is 'rampant' in schools: ICW
Eva C. Komandjaja, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
The way school textbooks are procured leaves the door open to corruption in elementary and junior high schools, involving not only principals but also teachers and school committees, a survey revealed.
The latest study conducted by the Indonesian Corruption Watch (ICW) in Jakarta, Garut and Surakarta discovered that corruption in book procurement often takes place ahead of a semester, when a school selects books for its students.
"Usually book publishers go to schools and persuade the principal to choose their books by offering a large discount," ICW head researcher Ade Irawan said, while unveiling the result of the study titled "High cost for low-quality education" here on Thursday at a discussion in which the survey results were presented.
The practice occurs since a principal has the authority to determine which books are compulsory for students in line with school autonomy, the report says.
"Publishers can offer discounts of up to 40 percent," Ade said.
Before the era of school autonomy, publishers approached officials at local education agencies to recommend preferred books for schools in the region.
Apart from book procurement, the survey, conducted on 1,000 respondents who were mostly parents in the three cities, found 12 other extra fees collected by schools without clear objectives and accountability.
Among the fees deem unnecessary by most parents is money collected in the event of principal replacement, sports fees, graduation ceremony fees and school maintenance fees.
"Based on our research, parents in Jakarta pay Rp 137,579 (US$15.28) each semester in such fees, while parents in Surakarta pay Rp 174,827," Ade said.
The decision to collect such fees rests with the principal and teachers, according to the study. Most parents say they were neither informed by the school about the purpose of the fees nor given access to reports on the use of the money.
Ade said low salaries of teachers were responsible for the rampant corruption in schools.
Director General of Elementary and Intermediate Education Indra Djati Sidi, who was present at the discussion, claimed that since institutions of learning had become autonomous corruption at schools was not as prevalent as in the past.
"Now that schools are free to choose their own textbooks, the scale of corruption has decreased. It is still there, but it's less, so I guess it's an improvement," Indra said.
The law on national education, which was enacted last year, says every citizen, starting at the age of six, is entitled to nine years of mandatory education for free.
Indra Djati said the stipulation remained ideal as the current education budget only accounts for up to 5.8 percent of the state budget, or around Rp 21 trillion.
"Ideally it should be 20 percent, most of which would be spent on teachers' salaries like it is in Norway and other Scandinavian countries," Indra said.
Apart from the budget constraints, Indra said it was difficult for the government to supervise schools in the region after the Autonomy Law came into force.
"Schools have the right to manage their money. It's the job of the local education agency and society to monitor the schools," Indra said.