Student faces uncertain future after failing exam

Nethy Dharma Somba, The Jakarta Post, Jayapura

The smiling face of 18-year-old Natalia Walela changes when asked about her senior high school final exams.

Natalia is one of tens of thousands of students nationwide who did not pass in the new examinations system, which requires students to reach a minimum 4.26 grade out of a possible 10 in each of five subjects to graduate. The students must repeat the failed subjects later in August before they get a pass.

"I did not expect it. I thought that I would have passed the exams as in general, I always produced good marks in the daily tests," Natalia said on Saturday.

Natalia only failed one out of her five subjects, economics, with a mark of 4.00.

When the exam results were announced, the eldest of three children, was staying in her hometown in Kimbim Wamena, Jayapura. She told her parents that she had completed each exams and was confident she would get through. However, when she returned to Jayapura to see her marks, she was disappointed.

Natalia's parents are farmers and the student is dead-set on pursuing higher education and getting a professional job. Her parents have supported her dream and have enrolled Natalia in a Catholic student dormitory for young women in Jayapura to help her study.

Sisters at the dormitory guide and encourage their students to study harder as well as teaching them religious subjects.

Each month, Natalia's parents pay enrollment fees of Rp 250,000 (US$26) and school fees of Rp 95,000.

Natalia says the cost of her studies, a lot for a working class farming family, meant her parents were upset when they found out she had failed.

"At first, my father was really mad. But later on he understood my situation and encouraged me to study harder in order to pass economics," Natalia said.

Natalia was also upset. She had imagined herself in a backpack, jeans and a casual shirt talking with other university students at a Jayapura campus this year.

She is now waiting for Aug. 22 when she can repeat the exam.

"I will certainly work hard, so I can get through," she said.

And like many young women, who want to lead independent lives, Natalia has another reason why she wants to go to university.

"If I fail again in the exam and cannot graduate from senior high school, I am afraid that my parents will marry me to a young man they have chosen."

Most young women in her age in Jayapura had already married and had children, she said.