Education is for the rich

Education is for the rich

From Koran Tempo

When delivering an election campaign address in Saburai
Square, Bandar Lampung, on June 28, vice presidential candidate
Jusuf Kalla promised to provide more financial assistance to
schoolchildren of poor parents. "Poor students will enjoy free
education. Rich students will not enjoy free education but will
have to pay more," he said.

While Jusuf Kalla deserves our praise in this respect, his
idea has come late because, since the Soeharto era, children of
rich parents have always been required to pay higher school fees
than those that come from badly-off families.

The problem lies in the implementation of this policy. Rich
parents try, by hook or by crook, to send their children to
government-funded good schools while children from poor families
have to enter private schools. They must pay higher school fees
and in return receive education of a lower quality. The children
of such people as Jusuf Kalla, Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and
Wiranto, for example, can easily be enrolled in excellent,
favored schools.

In future, the government should ensure that there will be an
equal opportunity for both poor and rich students to enjoy access
to good education. It is the government's job to make good
education affordable to the children of even the poorest parents.

The government should also consider requiring rich families to
make a donation for school development. That way the rich would
subsidize the poor.

HUMALA PONTAS S.
Jakarta