Mangunwijaya's dreams for education

Mangunwijaya's dreams for education

Yusup Priyasudiarja, Contributor, Yogyakarta

Mangunwijaya or affectionately called as Romo Mangun was widely
known as an architect, priest, intellectual, social worker and
novelist and also regarded by many as a fighter for the
liberation of the poor from stupidity, powerlessness and
injustice.

He toiled to help poor children and people in repressive
situations to be independent and to act on their own choices.
Born in Ambarawa in 1929 and involved in the struggle for
independence as a young soldier.

During the independence struggle, he was deeply touched by
Major Isman's speech during a reunion of Tentara Pelajar
Indonesia/TPI (Indonesian student battalions) in Malang in the
early 1950s. Isman said that the real heroes of the revolution in
the independence struggle were not soldiers but the people who
suffered during the war.

His valuable ideas on education have been collected in this
book, which consists of 39 essays published in Kompas in the
period 1974 to 1998. Even though some of his essays were written
before 1980, they are still relevant to today's educational
issues. This book, then, can serve as the heritage of his great
ideas on education for the young generation.

In most of his features, Mangunwijaya, the author of the novel
Burung-burung Manyar argues that basic education in elementary
school plays a significant role in the whole process of
education. The quality of basic education will determine the
quality of higher education. As children are by nature
explorative, creative and curious, teachers should provide
students with activities to stimulate them to be explorative
learners and critical thinkers.

Mangunwijaya notes that students should be stimulated to be
more critical, to ask a lot of questions, to observe their
surroundings, to analyze data and find their own answers. As
basic education is very vital, teachers in elementary schools
should also be creative, well-educated and qualified.

Jean Piaget, a Swiss philosopher and psychologist, best-known
for his pioneering work on the development of intelligence in
children, shows the stages of cognitive development of children.
He believes that children are not empty vessels to be filled with
knowledge but active builders of knowledge: little scientists who
are constantly creating and testing their own theories of the
world.

Children are basically explorative; they are the ones who
teach themselves. Hence their learning process can be optimally
achieved through active exploration. It seems that Mangunwijaya
was inspired by Jean Piaget's ideas on developmental psychology.

Besides, all children are basically clever, but it is the
teaching-learning process in class that makes them slow, as
illustrated by Jean Jacques Rousseau's "God makes all things
good; man meddles with them and they become evil."

One of Mangunwijaya's strong criticisms on education rests on
the educational system. He points out that we have oppressed (not
to mention "killed") our 30 million children every day through
our educational system in formal schools, in which methodology,
evaluation systems and management structure inhibit the
creativity, spontaneity and explorative natures of children in
their learning process (p.48).

In our educational system, evaluation systems such as THB,
NEM, EBTA, EBTANAS and many others, are considered the factors
that hamper the development of our education. The mushrooming of
courses (nonformal education) and the high interest of parents in
enrolling their children on courses indicate clearly the failure
of formal education in Indonesia.

Mangunwijaya put his ideas on education into practice by
running an alternative elementary school, Dinamika Edukasi Dasar
(Basic Education Institute) in Mangunan, Yogyakarta. He applied
the curriculum used by other formal schools but modified it by
adding some subjects such as question formulation and music
lessons.

Here, students are given the greatest opportunities to explore
and develop their creativity. SD Mangunan has become one of
examples of Mangunwijaya's work on education, in which its
education system is children-oriented. He also highlights the
importance of language mastery among his students. According to
him, language is the key to grasping as much information as
possible and to comprehending any culture.

As a product of Dutch colonial education, Mangunwijaya has
picked up some goods points on the colonial education system. He
points out that instead of the negative effects of Dutch
colonialism, we can learn positive things from their education.
Colonial teachers, with their humane educational background,
taught students to be gentle, to think progressively,
consistently and logically and to dared to say "waar of neit"
(right or wrong).

Hence the colonial education system incredibly manages to
produce good graduates having universal values, analytical
thinking and a strong character, such as the country's national
heroes Soekarno, Hatta, Syahrir, Soetomo, Agoes Salim, Adam
Malik, Maramis, etc.

Education is carried out through TV, which can serve not only
as a medium of entertainment, but also of education. Despite the
apparently negative aspects of teaching, such as low salaries and
overbureaucratization of education systems, teachers in China are
still dedicated and have self-esteem. Education should be the
main concern of our government if we really want to build a great
nation.

In this book, there are at least three points highlighted by
Mangunwijaya. First, it is hoped that there will be a law which
effectively protect children in all aspects of life from any
unfair treatment from other people, including parents and
teachers.

This book gives us a deeper insight into Mangunwijaya's vision
and concern for education in Indonesia. Now it is our task to
continue his great work to build the nation through better
education.