Educators mixed over new school term system

Damar Harsanto, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

Starting on Monday, about two million students from kindergarten to high schools in Jakarta will begin a new school year with the semester system instead of the quarter system, which is expected to help students learn their subjects more deeply.

"The new decree aims at giving some leeway to the teachers to implement the curriculum effectively and thoroughly so that the students master the subjects in depth," said Iing Ahmad Mumkin, Head of the elementary school division at the City Education Agency.

With a longer term, Iing said, the teachers would no longer feel rushed to accomplish the objectives required by the curriculum.

"Besides, fewer examinations in the new term also gives relief to parents who have already been burdened with too many costs in the past, especially exam fees," Iing said.

However, Iing added, the new term requires teachers to be more creative to use the existing leeway to boost competence of the students in the respective subjects.

Herman Yoseph, a principal of state junior high school 57 in Guntur, South Jakarta, expressed his pessimism that the new term would improve the quality of the education.

"The new term offers no fundamental changes in the practice of teaching activities in the classroom," said Herman, adding that the teachers as well as the students would still use the same books and curriculum.

Similarly, Nahijah, a principal of a state elementary school in West Jakarta, complained that the new term could spell trouble.

"Elementary school students can easily memorize things, but they also easily forget those things, so we need shorter terms to help refresh their memories over the subjects," she explained.

Nahijah said a semester would be too long for elementary students. "They will get really bored."

She also expressed concern that the new term would also mean less frequent meetings between parents and school teachers to discuss the students' progress.

Tati, a mother, believes that the quarter system is better because students need breaks to play and relax to be able to digest the lessons.

"A short period of study coupled with proper time to relax will enable them (the students) to get maximum results in their study," Tati said, adding that the students would always be fresh when it came time to study.

However, another teacher, Ali Arsyad lauded the new term as it would reduce his headaches in rushing to achieve the targets required by the curriculum.

"Instead of examinations at the end of every fourth month, we can have examinations every month to ensure the students mastery over the subjects," said Ali of state junior high school 229 in Kebon Jeruk, West Jakarta.

Ali, however, thought that the new term could backfire if the control towards the implementation of the program was weak.

"Tight monitoring and control of teachers will be necessary. Otherwise, teachers could forget the tasks to regularly check their students' mastery of the subjects," said Ali.

With a longer term, Ali said, lazy teachers could hold all the examinations in the last month of the semester.

The new system is stipulated by the new Ministry of National Education Decree No. 84, 2002.

Previously, in the 1984 curriculum, the Ministry of Education and Culture had implemented a semester system for junior high school and high school. In the 1994 curriculum, it changed to a quarter term, like the system for elementary schools, Iing said.

Data from the Jakarta chapter of the Central Bureau of Statistic in 2000 shows that there were 89,000 kindergarten students and 820,000 elementary students. Jakarta Junior high schools had 380,000 and high schools had 500,000.