Professor Shortage Crisis in New State Universities
Amidst the nation’s ambition to achieve the ‘Indonesia Emas 2045’ vision, a silent crisis is threatening the foundations of higher education equality. Across the archipelago, 36 new state universities (PTNB) collectively possess only 67 professors. This shocking deficit contrasts sharply with the thousands of professors concentrated in established universities on Java. Nationally, the number of professors accounts for only 3% of the total teaching staff, far below the ideal target of 10%. This represents an intellectual emergency that threatens the state’s ability to provide equitable access to quality education and weakens global competitiveness.
New state universities were established with the noble mandate to act as catalysts for higher education in regions historically marginalised from the national research and innovation ecosystem. However, without an adequate number of professors, these campuses struggle to build strong research traditions, manage academic regeneration, or serve as intellectual anchors for local communities. Ironically, Universitas Gadjah Mada (UGM) alone has 523 professors, nearly eight times the total number found in all 36 new state universities combined. This massive disparity reflects a systemic failure to nurture a conducive academic ecosystem outside traditional educational power centres.
The root of this inequality is multidimensional, stemming primarily from limited research capacity and rigid governance. Lacking adequate laboratories, international networks, or senior mentorship, young lecturers in new state universities must struggle alone to meet strict global publication standards. Furthermore, many new state universities remain trapped in rigid bureaucracies inherited from their status as working units (satker), which slows their transition towards the flexibility of public service agencies (BLU) or legal entity state universities (PTN-BH).
To overcome this crisis, bold and sustainable policy interventions are required through four main strategies. First, the implementation of a ‘reverse sabbatical’ scheme, where senior professors from established universities are deployed to new state universities for one to four years to mentor junior academics. These visiting professors could act as co-supervisors and help secure large research grants. Second, an administrative ‘fast-track’ is needed. While current regulations allow universities autonomy in setting publication requirements, the bureaucracy for credit assessments and promotions must be streamlined, with a target completion time of no more than six months to prevent ‘professor title mafia’ practices.
Third, the focus must shift to strengthening research consortium collaborations and reorienting funding. Lecturers in new state universities should be encouraged to participate as co-authors or principal investigators in large-scale research grants. Schemes such as the Indonesia Collaboration Research or World Class Research managed by BRIN should provide affirmative quotas for new state universities. Finally, LPDP funding should be reoriented from a heavy focus on Master’s and Doctoral programmes towards specific post-doctoral programmes designed to boost the publication productivity of PhD holders in these universities. Success in these agendas requires firm political commitment, strong budget allocation, and synergy between the Ministry of Education, BRIN, LPDP, and universities to ensure that new state universities do not become ‘second-class campuses’ that merely produce graduates without contributing to scientific progress.