Education: Learning from a crisis

Education: Learning from a crisis

By David Harries

JAKARTA (JP): Economic volatility and political uncertainty
are fostering fears for the future in Indonesia and its
neighbors, with good reason. The economic debacle is a global
trauma. The worst of its effects are yet to come, and their form
and force will be unknown until they arrive.

The hardest hurt from every prosperity and power level in
society are unlikely to be in a charitable and tolerant mood for
a long time to come. And, of most immediate concern, the end of
the Idul Fitri holiday signals the end of Ramadhan's calming
presence.

There are, however, two things about which there is no doubt.
And they deserve more attention than they are getting. One is
that the crisis, and crises it may spawn, will end. The other is
that the world will go on.

Supercilious waffle? Not if you are serious about both dealing
with the crisis and preparing for its aftermath. These two tasks
point us towards both medicine for the present and insurance for
the future.

They point at the young; the pre-schoolers, primary schoolers
and teenagers, who as adults will manage and lead in the future.
What they do as leaders and how well they do it depends on their
preparation; on their personal and professional development, on
their education.

Much is always made about the importance and value of
education as a key to sustaining national development and
increasing prosperity. In recent times, Asians have given
themselves high marks for their words and deeds on education.
Many outside the region have joined in the praise.

But, like so much else connected with the fall from grace of
the Asian "economic miracle", education is being exposed as the
recipient of at least as much lip service as system improvement
in the recent past. A 1997 article, The Silence of the Lambs, in
a major news magazine, described the situation in detail, even
before July's first currency melt down. It noted that education
in Asia, Southeast Asia in general, and Malaysia in particular,
was neither providing nor achieving what was claimed or needed.
In brief it failed to encourage critical thinking, analysis and
creativity.

By education, I do not focus on literacy. Achievement of
literacy is commendable, and countries such as Indonesia which
have greatly increased the size of the literate population have
much to be proud of. But literacy in the absence of real
opportunity to advance intellectually and make real improvements
to one's quality of life, is a double edged sword. People know
more because they can read. But, the more they know, the clearer
their perceptions of factors preventing betterment will become.
Dissatisfaction and anger are the logical reaction to any
perceived injustices.

By education, I do mean teachers and students in schools and
universities, working together in mutually responsible and
accountable ways. I mean qualified teachers striving to teach
students how to think critically, question and analyze. I mean a
partnership to produce graduates with the knowledge and skills
needed to survive and succeed in an environment of competitive
globalism.

In a country such as Indonesia, where the great majority of
the population are smallholder or subsistence farmers, further
education is hardly germane to the status quo. But the struggling
middle class and the newly literate no longer believe in the
status quo as best for them, or for their country. The structures
and processes which the country needs to operate as a full and
successful member of the global community can be developed and
operated effectively only by people whose education provides them
with the skills and confidence to do so.

Analogy to sport may be useful. To qualify for the right to
participate in the Olympic Games, an individual must first
achieve a standard. It is clearly posted and open to all who wish
to try. If you did not qualify you do not compete.

Too many schools, universities, students and teachers in Asia
are ignoring, or avoiding, the issue of quality and the need for
appropriate and credible qualifications. Too many individuals
want to earn their qualification, and expect to prosper from it,
with little or no work. Levels of accountability and
responsibility which would foster the necessary competence and
credibility are too often absent.

Sadly, there are today many reasons for this condition. Near
the head of the list, certainly in Indonesia, is the pay of the
teachers and lecturers, who are civil servants. It is so
desperately, unfairly and disproportionately low, relative to the
importance and value of the profession, that many -- I have been
told most -- teachers simply can not afford to maintain
professional competence at the necessary level or foster the
responsibility and accountability their profession calls for.

If the government of Indonesia could grant qualified teachers
a reasonable financial status, their performance in front of
students could only rise. The increase in their pride and
confidence would rub off on the students. If more students
understood the need for, and benefits of, a credible, earned
qualification, they would perform better. The result would be
fewer unprepared and incompetent graduates dropped into the work-
world to add to the numbers of un-and under-employed, a
particularly intense national issue in these hard economic times.

There is a role here for the international community as well.
First, overseas universities currently practicing academic
equivalents of affirmative action could de-emphasize the bottom
line "fee for presence" philosophy in favor of one more
orientated to "performance for future considerations".

Second, institutions could help soften the effects of the
currency melt-down. Families of a large number of Asian students
at universities overseas have been put in a terrible bind. Fees,
living and home-visit expenses have gone up many-fold. For what
is a truly tiny sum compared to the US$100 billion or $200
billion committed to bailing out the richest and most powerful in
only a handful of debt-embedded countries, every Asian student
studying overseas could have the "meltdown component" of his or
her current school fees covered, on the condition that his or her
work was of sufficient quality. In other words, deserving
students would deserve an academic equivalent of an IMF bailout.

Thirdly, the NGO could weigh in anew. Many have just completed
post-Cold War restructuring and re-missioning. Each of the major
organizations working in the social sector should add another
line to their task list: "Sponsor upgrades at strategic schools
in major centers in economically-stressed and academically weak
countries". The sponsorship would, in keeping with the theme of
quality, be subject to regular performance reviews. Failure to
perform would result in the activity being moved to another needy
institution.

The future will come. The young of today will be the leaders.
Education systems in Asia are mortgaging both, for a variety of
reasons. But even in these times of unprecedented financial
volatility and uncertainty, a relatively small and
uncontroversial investment from within and without the country
could be made which would pay enormous dividends for a future
which enjoyed less of both.

Window A: But, like so much else connected with the fall from
grace of the Asian "economic miracle", education is being exposed
as the recipient of at least as much lip service as system
improvement in the recent past.

Window B: Too many schools, universities, students and teachers in
Asia are ignoring, or avoiding, the issue of quality and the need
for appropriate and credible qualifications. Too many individuals
want to earn their qualification, and expect to prosper from it,
with little or no work.