Dutch school opens for Its doors

Dutch school opens for Its doors

Abdul Khalik, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Although the school uses Dutch as a language of instruction,
Lisa, 11, a sixth-year student of the Netherlands International
School (NIS) in Jeruk Purut, South Jakarta, talked in fluent
English about her school.

"I joined the school two years ago after my parents moved to
Indonesia. This is a great school, and I like it very much. Here,
I can learn English as well," she told The Jakarta Post on
Tuesday.

She said that she enjoyed learning English, and hoped she
could practice the language more.

Lisa's hope will soon be fulfilled because NIS, which was
established in the late 1960s has decided to adopt International
Primary Curriculum (IPC) which enables the school to carry most
of its lessons in English while maintaining Dutch and other
languages as a medium of instruction for certain subjects.

School board member Karen Peters said that they would begin
the new curriculum for preschool students in January before
applying it to the primary students later in August.

"We will welcome children of any nationality, including
Indonesians, to enroll in the school. With the new curriculum,
children of other nationalities, such as German, French, or
Indonesian, could learn reading, writing, and maths in their own
language and at the same time study other subjects in English,"
she told the Post.

The preschool has began accepting students from one-and-a-half
years old to four years old from other nationalities since the
beginning of the month.

Peters said that students who studied under the new curriculum
would have a school certificate that is recognized
internationally after they graduated, and could continue their
studies anywhere in the world.

As the oldest international school in the country, NIS
currently has 120 students, comprising of 40 preschool students
and 80 primary school students.

"After over 30 years of only accepting children from Dutch or
families where one of the parents is Dutch, we have decided to
open our school to the wider community by using English as our
medium of instruction. We do this because we want to reach out to
more students," NIS principal Th. J. M. Gunneweg said.

He added that many Dutch citizens here need English
proficiency as they often do not go back to the Netherlands but
continue working in other countries, most of the time English-
speaking countries.

Mrs. Bosch, who was waiting to pick up her children, welcomed
the school's plan to introduce a new curriculum saying that the
use of English as the medium of instruction in school would
surely attract more students, and provide language skills for the
children.

"This is a very good school with very good facilities and very
good curriculum. I have two children here, and, of course, I want
them to master English for their future," she said.