Prospects for Internet-based learning in Indonesia

Sidatajudi, Surabaya

I once read an article written by a local education activist proposing the nationwide adoption of Internet-based distance learning to help provide quality tertiary education at a low cost for those living in small towns. Although the idea is very noble, there are some very serious challenges that need to be addressed before we can see Web-based distance learning offered by Indonesian colleges and universities.

The first challenge is, of course, the availability of a market for this service. Many universities in the northern hemisphere, where most of the developed countries are located, except perhaps Australia and New Zealand, offer Web-based learning because they have a big potential market for the service. These countries, especially the English-speaking ones, have for many years been the destinations for thousands of students wishing to obtain the kind of quality education they cannot find in their homelands.

These students, along with others who wish they could afford to study overseas, are a huge and lucrative market for Web-based learning, which is a lower-cost alternative that still offers the opportunity to combine "global vision" with "local knowledge". This "global vision, local knowledge" mind-set is also the reason the main target of many Web-based services is working professionals who wish to leverage their skills by pursuing a second degree while keeping their day jobs.

Those living in small towns in Indonesia do not seem to constitute this kind of market yet. There are not many working executives who wish to get a second degree among them, and the high school graduates have very few reasons to stay in the towns and take Web-based distance learning, as these towns do not hold many jobs for them upon the completion of their studies.

The fact that those living in bigger towns and cities can conveniently attend regular day or evening classes, and that Indonesian colleges and universities have not been the destination for many foreign students, would only leave any institution offering Web-based learning scrambling for a niche market. And, as in any business, a small-scale market will not enjoy the benefit of low cost, which is the purpose of Web-based learning in the first place.

Another serious challenge is the telecommunications and Internet infrastructure in Indonesia. It is common knowledge that the telecom costs in Indonesia are among the highest in the world. Many years ago, even before the era of Internet Protocol (IP) telephony, a phone call from the U.S. to Surabaya, which was relayed via Jakarta, was cheaper than one from Jakarta to Surabaya. And unlike telecom carriers in many developed countries that charge a lump sum for local calls, regardless of usage, PT Telkom -- the state-owned telecom monopoly in Indonesia -- charges by minutes of usage. The more we use the phone to access the Internet, the bigger our phone bill will be. The recent price hike only makes it worse.

To cut costs, naturally, people turn to ISP's that offer a large bandwidth, which means faster downloads. Unfortunately, bandwidth is not cheap and these ISP's do not charge on a lump sum basis either. When they do, only corporations can afford to pay for it, as the amount is way beyond the reach of household users. Furthermore, these ISP's only provide their services in big cities.

It is true that we have Telkomnet Instan, but this is not a good alternative. Despite its existing network that covers many cities and towns, its bandwidth is simply not adequate. Downloading a 700-kilobyte Portable Document Format (PDF), which is equivalent to 15 A4 pages, using Telkomnet Instan takes on average 20 minutes. As Telkom charges Rp 165 per minute, or roughly Rp 10,000 per hour, excluding VAT, downloading these 15 A4 pages is more expensive that making a Xerox copy of them, which only costs Rp 150 per page. The cost of paper and ink to make hard copies of these downloads is not included in the price comparison.

The last, but definitely not the least, of the challenges is the issue of copyright protection and credit card fraud in Indonesia. Our reputation for copyright infringement is so widely known in the world that if you want to take a music exam locally from an internationally acclaimed London-based school of music, you must prove that you have an original copy of their exam book with your name on it, in ink. People have not yet fully understood that each and every copy of a textbook, even in electronic form, must be paid for.

The most convenient way to pay for downloading copyright- protected files is by credit card. But how can we enjoy this convenience when only a few companies on the Internet are willing to take the risk of accepting our credit cards? An American institution that has many students in Surabaya taking its distance learning postgraduate management program had to open an office here to securely receive payments and to save the students the hassle of having to make an international wire transfer.

On the other hand, as the idea of providing a quality education for those living in small towns is noble, we have to think of ways to get around these challenges. Before we pursue this goal on a grand scale, it is a good idea to start small. For instance, we could start with Internet-based nonformal, nontertiary education. This service must also be free of charge and contain no copyright-protected material.

One easy example that comes to mind is a Web service that provides regularly updated information on the best practices for small and medium-sized businesses. Anybody running a home industry or a distribution shop could learn some management lessons from this homepage. It might also contain success stories of the best run cooperative(s) in Indonesia. Business tips and dos/don'ts would be useful as well. Hopefully, the free content would justify the cost of the Internet connection.

Who, then, should offer this service and provide the content? Any educational institution that offers management/accounting majors would be qualified to do this. Internally developed materials would ensure that the content could be distributed freely, without any copyright concerns.

Unfortunately, only the government can -- but is so far not willing to -- solve the problem of our telecommunications and Internet infrastructure. Although the government has deregulated this sector to break the current state of monopoly, what we will have in the future is still a heavily regulated oligopoly, not a truly free market-driven industry.

The writer works as a sales manager for an air-conditioning company in Surabaya.