Surabaya Education Agency Deploys Supervision Teams to Ensure Violence-Free School Orientation

The Surabaya City Education Office (Dispendik) has deployed a supervision team to ensure the school environment orientation programme (MPLS) runs without violence.

“We are carrying out supervision. All of our teams will take turns visiting the schools that are holding MPLS today,” said Head of the Surabaya Education Office, Febrina Kusumawati, in Surabaya on Monday (13 July).

The team is deployed on a rotating basis to check on MPLS activities at schools across the City of Heroes. Dispendik Surabaya is also ensuring that a complaint centre remains open for anyone wishing to raise concerns about the MPLS process. “Our central complaint post is open, for anything at all — not just MPLS,” she added.

She also asked parents not to worry about the implementation of MPLS, as the education office has already instructed all schools that the programme must be free of hazing and violence.

“We are emphasising that children should get to know their school more deeply before they begin full lessons next Monday,” she explained.

Schools have also been asked to focus on introducing facilities to students, along with teaching methods and standard operating procedures. “Who their teachers are, where their classrooms are, and then what the SOPs and stages are here. If I have a stomach ache, where should I go? That is what the children are taught. So parents need not worry, as the school principals have also conveyed. And if children tell their parents about anything, they are welcome to confirm it with the teachers,” she said.

She stressed that parents should trust the schools, especially as monitoring is being carried out up to the level of the Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education (Kemendikdasmen).

The Surabaya City Education Office has requested that all schools conduct the school environment orientation programme (MPLS) in a friendly manner, without hazing or excessive physical activity.