With over 46 million students and 2.8 million teachers in more than 227,000 schools, Indonesia is the fourth largest education system in the world—similar in size to the United States.

Raising Education Standards – Training In-service Teachers using Technology

Two hours drive from Surabaya at a Christian church in Jombang  a pilot project is being established to provide teachers at a church school and other schools in the district with the ability to study online for a degree qualification.

TRAMPIL (Transformasi Melalui Pendidikan dengan e-Learning) has set a target of training 10,000 Christian in-service teachers between 2011-2016.  These unqualified teachers are currently teaching in schools and while the project’s end result is degree qualified teachers to comply with the Indonesian Governments 2005 Teacher Law, it provides the greater opportunity to transform the nature of education and to educate teachers in excellent teaching practices using some of the latest educational technology tools.

Teachers will actually be learning with technology themselves, developing learning and technology skills which they can pass on to their students.  Using a variety of educational technologies teachers will be able to create engaging learning experiences for their students who can interact with each other, their teacher and others around the world through internet enabled communications.  Many of these students are already interacting with others through technology – they are constructing, communicating, competing, collaborating – the teacher having learned with various technologies will be better equipped to utilise technologies in learning experiences to enhance learning and engage students.

The pilot project in Jombang has involved setting up a room in the Christian school with 20 computers.  Each has a 14inch CRT monitor and is connected to the internet via a 45km microwave link to an ADSL connection in Tulungagung. Web conferencing equipment and software is also installed to facilitate discussion with online tutors and participants.

None of this hardware is cheap for the school and it had been a while since I looked at a 14inch CRT screen!  But the church budget can only stretch so far.  They have done well to get where they are today and are appreciative of the financial support provided to them by supporters.  Schools in Australia have had similar computer rooms available for a number of years and despite being available to students they have tended to be underutilised because teachers arent familiar with the technology or the opportunities it allows.

Teachers studying from the learning centre will have the support of a learning mentor or academic pastor who is available to assist with using the elearning technology and also provide guidance and mentoring in education.  Ideally this person will be an experienced and well trained, qualified school leader.

Talks are being held with University of Nusa Cendana and Satya Wacana Christian University (currently using Moodle to deliver online courses) in Salatiga for the provision of e-learning courses which teachers can participate in for their degree.

There are a number of resources which need to be provided for this project to be successful:

• teachers need to commit time, money and effort to study and apply learning
• teachers need funding to participate in university degree courses
• partnerships with Christian universities providing online courses need to be established
• teacher trainers need to be available to run workshops
• courses need to exhibit “best practice” teaching models
• learning mentors need to be funded and equipped with training
• internet access needs to be funded
• connectivity infrastructure and installation requires funding
• schools require computer hardware to be funded and installed
• scholarship funds could be established by Indonesian churches globally

The establishment of this learning centre not only equips the local Christian church with the ability to provide training opportunities for teachers in the district, but it becomes a centre for online learning for all.  School principals and administrators can attend online leadership seminars.  Teachers can attend professional development courses and online conferences.  Students and others from the community  can come to the centre to participate in all sorts of courses available online.  Courses in economics, engineering, health, science, agriculture as well as education could all be delivered online and accessible to learners who could be applying that knowledge into small businesses microfinanced by the Indonesian government.

Indonesia – An Online Community, Technology Literate

People in Indonesia are very well connected through the internet already, mostly onto internet enabled mobile phones.

• Facebook – Indonesia is the second most active nation on Facebook (Indonesia has 28million users, 100% active; USA 1st – 140million users but only 63% are active).
• Twitter – Indonesia is the most active nation contributing 20.8% daily Tweets (Brazil 2nd with 20.5%, USA 11.9%).
• 60% of all internet traffic is accessed on mobile devices
• 120million cell phone subscribers, 40million new expected in 2010
• Indonesia is expected to be the third largest mobile market in Asia behind China and India end of 2010

Indications and personal observations are that the people of Indonesia are connecting and contributing globally through the use of technology.  Connecting to friends, family in Indonesia or around the world. Connecting to learning opportunities, pastors, teachers, Bible studies……

The challenge for the Christian Church in Indonesia is to connect with people through these available and highly accessed technologies – using Twitter, Facebook and other mobile social networking apps, to provide learning, outreach and discipleship opportunities.

28% of the current population is aged under 14, that’s 70 million people. How interactive and attached to technology and mobile devices will that generation grow to be?  Smartphones in India are getting closer to the USD$100 price – we should begin to see a growing increase of smartphone users in Indonesia in the next 2 years as these phones become available.

The opportunity is right for the Church to be developing learning apps and mobile accessible courses or course interactivity features so that these learners can take advantage of the technology available to them to grow more  spiritually mature; be equipped with resources for outreach and discipleship; technically able to connect and communicate with one another.  Teachers who learn with technology are highly likely to use technology with their students – who are already engaging through technology.

Christian Church reclaiming Higher Education through Technology

The church has been providing Christian pre-school, primary and high school education for many years now, but still largely handing children over to state universities for the classical lecture style teaching in contexts which typically strip out any view of the loving, sovereign God of the Bible who created all and is to be honoured in all we do.  Bombarding them simultaneously with multiple subjects and assignments and events universities can be incredibly intense, dynamic, pressure places for our young people rather than communities of learning where divergent thinking, depth of focus, community contributions and wholistic personal mentoring and discipleship in Christ’s name can transform.

Once equipped with learning centres like this pilot project in Jombang, churches in Indonesia – even the remotest of the remote – will be able to provide high school leavers with the option of continuing their study at tertiary level.  Student’s worldview formation, character and life skills can be shaped by Biblically based, modular styled teaching,  facilitated by the local church, transforming lives, communities and nations.  This could become a model to the Church worldwide as we begin to see young people with solid foundations established spiritually, academically, morally and socially transform their nation.

Education System Overview

The Indonesian education system consists of the following levels: pre-school, basic, secondary, and higher education.   Basic education consists of nine years of schooling (six years of primary and three years of junior secondary school).  The goal of basic education is to develop students as individuals, productive members of society, citizens, members of humankind, as well as to prepare students to pursue study in secondary education.

In addition to public schools, Indonesia has more than 50,000 private schools.  About 87 percent of the private schools are Islamic of which about 60 percent are primary and junior secondary  madrasahs (schools that teach the general curriculum  and Islamic religion) and 28 percent are pesantren (Islamic boarding schools).  Madrasah Ibtidaiyah (MI), equivalent to primary school, and  Madrasah Tsanawiyah (MTs), equivalent to junior secondary school, are managed and run by the Ministry of Religious Affairs (MORA).

Christian Schools in Indonesia

Indonesia has around 6000 Christian schools scattered across the country (this is a country made up of over 17500 islands) with many in isolated and remote areas.  These schools are providing education for more than 250 000 children.  The latest available data indicates that there may be as many as 30000 of the 50000 Christian teachers who do not have the qualifications required by the Government of Indonesia to continue teaching after 2015, unless they complete a degree.

Teacher Qualifications

The government of Indonesia’s 2005 Teacher law mandates that a teacher must possess a bachelors degree and be professionally certified by 2015 or they cannot teach.  This is the most pressing motivator for initiating projects like the church based learning centre in Jombang.

In February 2001 the Indonesian Ministry of National Education (MONE) began drafting new legislation on education in response to the poor standard of education that was available to Indonesian children.

• Indonesia is amongst the very lowest of nations in total education spending -  1.5% of GDP (placed 47th,  behind USA 4th on 8% and New Zealand 9th with 6.5%), it has since dropped to 1.2%(UNESCO).
• of the 2.8million teachers 61% of all teachers were unqualified (1.7million)
• 84% of in-service primary school teachers are not qualified
• an estimated 80% of teachers had parallel jobs (usually private tuition)
• the school week consisted of only 15 hours of tuition
• teaching was done primarily in a rote or teacher-centric style where students tended to “fill in the gaps” rather than engage and interact in constructive learning experiences.
• Indonesian adults (aged 15 and over)  have an average of only 5 years of schooling
• 53% of the workforce has an education at Basic level (Grade 1-6) or below
• 60% of the Indonesian population live on less than USD$2 per day

Government reforms (with support from EU, AUSAID, USAID) are targetting key areas to improve education in the nation:

1. quality of instruction and pedagogy
2. improved school management and governance
3. construction and extension of school buildings

The Indonesian government is receiving financial support from:

• Australia (AUSAID – AUD$500m in 2010 to build schools, AUD$35m specifically for Islamic schools) Australia also delivered AUD$387million 2006-2009 to construct state and Islamic schools in Indonesia.
• European Union (USD$500m)
• United States (USAID)
• Japan (USD$6m).

With education being a key sphere for developing and transforming a nation, the government with foreign support is taking steps to improve education for Indonesian children.

In the largest Muslim nation on Earth, how is the Indonesian church working to help future generations of their nation?  The Teacher eLearning pilot project in Jombang is seeking to answer that question. Providing a model for transforming education, enhancing learning for students and providing infrastructure for higher education opportunities for the community.  The church must look at supporting projects such as this.

Sources:

http://www.usaid.gov/pubs/cbj2003/ane/id/

http://bit.ly/9S4fUE – Indonesia mobile statistics

http://europa.eu/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=MEMO/10/206&format=HTML&aged=0&language=EN&guiLanguage=en

http://ec.europa.eu/europeaid/where/asia/country-cooperation/indonesia/indonesia_en.htm

http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2008/s2444247.htm

http://hdrstats.undp.org/en/countries/country_fact_sheets/cty_fs_IDN.html

http://bit.ly/bbQHos