North Sumatra Governor Stresses School Committees Must Not Burden Students

Medan (ANTARA) - North Sumatra Governor Bobby Nasution has stressed that the existence of school committees must not become a burden for students in the region. Instead, he said, school committees should help ease the burden on students and parents, particularly regarding Education Development Contributions (SPP). “School committees should be established to lighten the burden on students and parents, not become a burden,” Bobby asserted, accompanied by Binjai Mayor Amir Hamzah, during the virtual opening of the School Environment Introduction Period (MPLS) for state senior high schools, vocational schools, and special needs schools across North Sumatra at SMA Negeri 1 Binjai, North Sumatra, on Monday. The governor also highlighted the lack of oversight of school committees to date. Furthermore, he said school committees must be adept at seeking opportunities to help ease the burden on parents, such as through corporate social responsibility (CSR) programmes. “So I ask the Head of the North Sumatra Education Office, if necessary, who supervises these school committees? No one does. If we can look into it, perhaps school committees need to be supervised,” he said. He explained that the school committee members selected must be parents of students from that school, in accordance with the Minister of Education and Culture Regulation (Permendikbud) Number 75 of 2016 concerning School Committees. This is because his office has also found school committee members who are not parents of students at the school, and the criteria for a school committee member do not require them to be a prominent figure or to be well-off. According to him, school committees must be adept at seeking opportunities outside the school and should not be a nuisance within the school. “If it is just a matter of chairing a meeting and deciding on a figure, I think there is no need for a committee,” Bobby explained. “It is better if we invite our children together to agree on a figure, let us do it like that. Rather than the committee ultimately deciding on an amount that ends up being burdensome, the impact is very long. Ultimately, parents put pressure on their children,” he added. The governor stated that the current burden of schooling is extraordinary for students and parents, especially regarding the issue of SPP in the 33 districts and cities across North Sumatra. “We asked parents what programmes we need to create. Their complaints, besides infrastructure, are that school fees are very expensive, and sometimes they cannot afford to pay. Some pay Rp100,000, some Rp50,000, so this is a burden for parents sending their children to school,” Bobby revealed. The governor mentioned that parents at schools hope that SPP can be made free of charge because it is a contribution, not an obligation. “That is why this free SPP initiative has been introduced. We ask for your patience, as budget-wise we have not yet implemented it across all 33 districts and cities; only 10 districts and cities have had it made free,” he said. “We promise that by 2029, all SPP at state senior high schools, vocational schools, and special needs schools will be free. We will do this gradually until 2029,” he concluded.