Indonesia's school face a dilemma about idealism

Indonesia's school face a dilemma about idealism

By Mochtar Buchori

JAKARTA (JP): From my childhood on until my late twenties I
was continuously exposed to a rather romantic view of education.
I was always told that education is a very powerful cultural
force that shapes the future of our nation.

To illustrate this view it was always pointed out to me that
all our national leaders -- from Dr. Wahidin Wirahoesada to Bung
Karno and Bung Hatta -- succeeded in changing the political
panorama of the country because their education gave them the
ability to read the course of history and see the historical
possibility for bringing about a big political change.

These national leaders were able to transcend the colonial
design of their education, and used all the knowledge and skills
they had received to marshal the existing popular force for
strengthening the national struggle towards independence.

Years of exposure to this kind of rhetoric made me believe,
for quite a time, that education is indeed a great cultural
force.

Since the early 1960s, however, I have gradually lost this
belief. My real life experiences since that time completely
changed this romantic view.

Education has, in my view, stopped being a cultural force in
this country. It has no longer the capability to influence the
course of political development. Rather it has become an
instrument of politics. The relationship between education and
politics has become asymmetric.

Noting how our educational establishment behaved when facing
political pressures -- both at the time of the old order and
during the present new order -- I cannot escape the impression
that education exists primarily to serve the interest of the
political establishment, and fails to defend its basic
principles.

The very sad thing in this regard is that politics itself does
not seem to be an independent force in this country. Until very
recently politics has been dancing to the tunes of the big
economic players.

The existing relationship between politics, economy and
education suggests that economy has been the real master of the
house, politics has been "the butler" of the economy, and
education has all this time been "the valet" of politics.
Education has thus become "the valet of a butler".

Of course, no educational system in this world can afford to
neglect the political interest of the nation.

However, any responsible and respectable system always retains
the right to decide how a national program for political
education should be designed, and how it should be delivered.

No respectable educational system gives a full mandate to
political entities outside the system to design and develop a
finished program for political education.

This policy has been adopted for the reason that politicians
do not in general know much and care little about pedagogical
sensitivities.

The present behavior of education also indicates that
educational idealism is vanishing. We no longer have educational
visionaries who, like the late Ki Hadjar Dewantara and the late
Ki Mohamad Said, always reflect about the kind of human being
that education should produce in order to bring about a given
kind of ideal society.

We no longer have educational leaders who reflect about the
relationship that should be fostered between educational idealism
and political idealism, and translate these reflections into
educational programs.

We no longer have educational idealist who, again like Ki
Hadjar Dewantara and Ki Mohamad Said, consistently refuse to
subjugate education to politics.

These two leaders had their political views and beliefs, but
once these views and beliefs were translated into educational
principles no one was allowed to change them for the sake of
pragmatic political gains.

What is educational idealism? It is a view concerning the
ideal man that will emerge from the educational process. No real
educator works without educational idealism. No real educator,
for instance, will allow his or her disciples to remain trapped
by the habit of solving existing problems through the "easiest
way".

Instead, they will drill their pupils to solve any problem
through the "right way", no matter how difficult and bothersome
this path may initially seem to be.

This principle is consistently implemented out of deep concern
for the future of the children. They are concerned that the habit
of solving problems through "short cuts" will make them believe
that the key to success in life is "outsmarting" others, and that
life is made for them. Such an attitude will constitute a serious
handicap later on in real life.

This question about educational idealism has become
significant now that more and more parents begin to demand
schools to prepare their children seriously for life in the
globalized world.

These parents realize that life patterns have changed
dramatically in this time of globalization, and that our old ways
of educating children will not suffice for the future.

Our old educational system that has become accustomed to serve
the interest of politics suddenly is expected to become an avant-
garde force.

Can our educational system meet this expectation? Not as long
as our educational community refuses to acknowledge that there is
a functional relationship among education, politics and economy,
and as long as it chooses to remain ignorant about these two
other forces.

And not as long as it looks upon politics as an untouchable
force, and upon economy as a force that belittles education. In
short, education must first recover its own sense of identity and
its sense of self-respect.

I am afraid that it will take a while before our educational
community can elevate itself from its current social and academic
status to a higher one.

And this will be acquired only if and when education as an
academic discipline has developed a new way of looking at the
task of bringing up children, in which the social and cultural
aspects are systemically analyzed.

In the meantime the Indonesian school is in a real dilemma.

On the one hand, it has to seriously prepare the young
generation for life in a globalized era, which it knows cannot be
done if it persistently clings to the present official program.

But on the other hand it has no freedom to modify or change
this program, because its hands are tied by the rigid policies
adopted by the bureaucracy.

Our schools have to make the painful choice of either serving
the young generation for the sake of the future of the nation, or
serving the bureaucracy just for the sake of bureaucratic
obedience.

It is a question that deeply touches the conscience of every
good educator.

The writer is an observer of social and political affairs.