More than 60% of the national education budget in Indonesia is used to improve teachers’ welfare. The budget is used in almost 100% of all regions in the country. However, raising salaries and providing teacher allowances do not necessarily improve the quality of learning or the number of school graduates.
The Indonesian Government has succeeded in expanding access to education. With almost all children in Indonesia now in school, how can we ensure that they receive quality learning and master the skills appropriate to their level of education? Read the five actions summarised from the RISE studies in Indonesia and other countries.
If students do not master foundational skills in the short term, they cannot attain more complex education goals in the long term.
As education systems focus on quality over inputs, teacher unions require technical expertise to be able to shape education policy.
The mounting problem confronting Indonesia in the future is the poor quality of student learning outcomes. If we allow this, the majority of our human resources will not be able to compete globally. This means that we cannot take advantage of the Industrial Revolution, 4.0 which requires a reliable and innovative workforce.
The world is entering the fourth digital revolution or industrialisation. The use of the Internet of Things (IoT), big data, cloud database, blockchain, and others will change the pattern of human life. In the future, teaching students could also be the function of digital companies. Children can learn anywhere other than at school.
The success of Indonesian students in winning various international science olympics is exciting news. Outside the competition, the result of international tests such as the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) in 2015, which placed Indonesian students in 62nd place out of 70 countries, was sad news indeed. Since participating in this test in 2003, Indonesia has not made any significant progress.
The gap in quality between schools in this country is also very large and has not been resolved to date. One reason is that the stakeholders and policy makers in Indonesia have been shackled by the illusion of progress for so long, which manifests itself in the rise of isomorphic mimicry.
The latest research by RISE Programme in Indonesia (RISE) on teacher recruitment policies and practices further emphasise the muddle in teacher governance policies. The next question is, is it true that the main problem for our teachers rests in the poor selection process for prospective teachers, which results in a less quality learning process?
Indonesian students' competency scores in reading, mathematics, and science in 2018 were lower than in similar assessment in the previous three years. Instead of improving, last year's reading skill score was equivalent to 2000. Why did Indonesian students’ assessment results in the global study, held every three years, drop significantly?