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.