RI's higher education system battles to make advances
RI's higher education system battles to make advances
Doctors, lawyers, military officers and artists: these are a
few of the professions obtainable by Indonesian students of higher
education today.
Although Indonesia is still developing its education system,
it offers a significant choice of educational fields -- almost to
the degree of any Ivy League school in America or any centuries-
old, tradition-bound institution in Europe.
Hundreds of thousands of students are studying in the
country's universities in order to land a decent-paying job, to
equip themselves with knowledge for knowledge's sake or to drift
through courses only because they do not know what else to do
with their lives at this point.
Whatever the reason or goal, the Indonesian higher education
system has developed programs to take them as high as they wish
to go, from a simple undergraduate degree or vocational diploma
to brain surgeon or academic professor.
It was not always like this. Only 52 years ago, Indonesia
found itself free to set its own educational path instead of
following the academic programs of a colonial authority.
But with this freedom, the leaders of the new country
inherited a Dutch-built education system which, although
exceptional in quality, only educated a tiny fraction of the
population.
"The Dutch system was like an ivory tower," said Prof. Conny
Semiawan, a former rector of Jakarta's Teachers Training
Institute (IKIP) and now the director of the Consortium for
Educational Services.
"It was solid but limited to a very few people."
The Dutch education system catering to indigenous Indonesians
was primarily designed to create a few well-trained local elites
to supplement the colonial administrative staff.
The Dutch made some efforts to educate a broader section of
society in the 20th century, but a 1930s census showing a
literacy rate of 4 percent indicates that access to education was
sharply limited.
It was from this abandoned ivory tower that Indonesia had to
craft a national academic village.
"Now, accessibility is one of the main focuses in our
education system," says Conny.
In fact, the framers of the new nation's Constitution espoused
egalitarian ideals on the issue, stating that the search for
knowledge was not only the purview of the elite but that quality
education should be opened up to all levels of society.
And so Indonesia finds itself today with 76 government-run
universities and 1,228 private universities when half a century
ago there were only a handful.
During this short period, the country built hundreds of new
institutions, trained new teachers, structured a new curriculum,
developed new textbooks and enrolled millions of new students,
all with just a few qualified and properly educated teachers and
administrators at the time of independence.
Indonesian universities currently teach about 11.5 percent of
the country's youth between 19 years and 25 years of age.
According to Prof. Bambang Soehendro, the director general of
higher education, that is an increase of about 3 percent from a
decade ago, though he admits it is well behind the average 40
percent to 50 percent levels found in developed countries.
"We hope to increase that to 25 percent in the next 25 years,"
said Bambang.
The increased accessibility to a higher education is the
result of a developing infrastructure made up of state and
private universities and vocational academies, the former
providing traditional and religious-based academic curriculums
and the latter focusing on the training of specific professions
such as secretaries, electricians and computer technicians.
In keeping with the education goals outlined in the mid-1940s,
the system today does not only open itself to the elite in
society. The state-run universities are government subsidized to
make education available to lower-income students, and enrollment
into these schools is determined primarily from tough entrance
exams.
But admissions are limited nonetheless, making the competition
for available spaces in the state-run schools fierce.
"The test was really difficult," said Yayuk, a second-year
architecture student at Pancasila University in Depok.
Yayuk's state university entrance exam (UMPTN) score was not
high enough for her to be admitted into the state university
system, but she was still able to choose from hundreds of private
schools before deciding on attending Pancasila.
Private schools provide an opportunity to receive a higher
education for students who cannot get into state-run
universities. Though most university bound students hope to be
admitted to a state-run school because of the lower tuition, many
private schools offer a high quality education and a good variety
of choices.
Yayuk's tuition for her first year at Pancasila was Rp 7
million. Her remaining tuition payments are about Rp 800,000 for
each subsequent semester.
Windy, Yayuk's cousin and a first-year accounting student at
the state-run University of Indonesia (UI) in Depok, paid only Rp
825,000 for her entrance tuition, while her subsequent semester
fees run Rp 500,000.
But when Indonesia's brightest (and richest) look for a
quality education, they often look away from the country's
schools entirely.
Despite Indonesia's fantastic educational advances, a foreign
education is deemed by most students and parents as highly
preferable.
Reputation
"Abroad absolutely," answered Windy when asked if she would
rather study at a foreign school, despite the fact that UI is the
second-highest ranked university in Indonesia. Yayuk concurred,
but both said their parents do not have enough money to send them
away to school.
Future jobs and larger salaries are behind such answers. Job
applicants with foreign educations simply score better jobs and
higher salaries than their domestically educated peers because
overseas schools are more highly regarded.
"The system is currently not producing a workforce which is
required by the modern economy," said Prof. Mochtar Buchori,
former rector of the Islamic Muhammadiyah Teaching Institute and
former vice chairman of the National Institute of Sciences.
"What is needed is a workforce that is highly retrainable ...
the system is not teaching students the basics as it should."
He explained that the education system, although providing for
a greater number of students than during colonial times, has been
thinned out during its expansion and has too few properly trained
lecturers and below standard facilities.
Bambang Soehendro is not hesitant to voice some of the same
concerns. "Quality has been affected by the fact that 60 percent
of (state-run university) teachers have only an S1 education
(roughly the equivalent to a bachelor's degree). At private
universities, about 80 percent of the teachers have an S1
education."
The bottom line is money, and Indonesian universities on
average cannot allocate as much funds to each student's education
as many foreign schools can.
Bambang admits that Indonesia's GNP needs to rise before
schools can markedly improve their quality.
This is not likely to happen in the next year or two with
Indonesia mired in its worst economic crisis in 30 years.
Ironically the crisis, though hurting Indonesian universities
with higher costs and some student dropouts, is forcing many
students wishing to study abroad to look at domestic schools.
Foreign universities may prove too expensive now that the rupiah
has fallen about 70 percent against the U.S. dollar since last
July.
Out of reach?
Monash University in Australia may be losing one such student.
Bobbi, 19, is planning to apply to a private Indonesian
university in June since he cannot afford Monash's tuition with
the rupiah remaining so weak. He hopes to be able to study abroad
later if the economic situation improves.
Many of the 60,000 Indonesian students already studying
overseas have had to pull out their calculators to figure out if
they can still afford tuitions and living expenses that have
increased fourfold in rupiah terms.
More than 15,000 Indonesian students studying in North America
may receive temporary U.S. and Canadian government-backed
assistance to help them continue their studies.
Help is also being offered to Indonesian students wishing to
study in Britain in the form of scholarships and special
packages.
The British Council, an organization that, among other things,
runs British educational projects in Indonesian, together with 35
British higher education institutions, has set up several
counseling centers throughout Indonesia to advise students and
their parents on how to obtain one of its more than 450 overseas
scholarships. The program will provide a total of US$1.5 million,
with $3.5 million in matching funds from the British government.
"At this point, the effort is the largest being made by any
single country for Indonesian students," said Geoff Evans of the
British Council.
These various efforts also include scholarships from Standard
Chartered Bank, one of the largest international banks operating
in Indonesia, and special services from companies like DHL to
help students and their families better cope with the financial
crisis while advancing their education.
The Australian government has also put together a number of
"development" scholarships for Indonesian students, though the
move may not have been inspired by the crisis.
The Indonesian government, however, is not standing idly by as
many of the country's students look to other shores to spend
their precious foreign exchange. On Feb. 27, the then minister of
education and culture Wardiman Djojonegoro announced sweeping
measures to deregulate the education sector in a bid to
strengthen the ailing competitiveness of Indonesia's human
resources.
The move allows foreign universities to set up operations in
Indonesia, grants state-run universities the right to raise funds
from the public and permits English to be used to teach up to 50
percent of the subjects at any university.
"It would be good for the country if we could keep more of our
students home," said Bambang. He thinks that direct competition
between foreign universities and domestic universities in the
country will raise the quality of the system.
Bambang also said the government would allocate future state
development funds to universities based on performance and that
it was currently setting up an accreditation system.
Although it may take some time to erase the perception held by
many in Indonesia that foreign universities are superior to
domestic ones, it is clear that the Indonesia's higher education
system is once again battling to make substantial qualitative and
quantitative advances over the coming years.