Three Reasons Why Indonesian Education Fails

Indonesian government biggest expense is on education. The expense consistently increases year by year making other units such as health, defense and others taking its drawbacks. A lot of people, nowadays, begin to question our education system even to the extent of criticizing it. Many suggest that the big bonus given to the teachers doesn't help to improve the student's output. In fact, the biggest critic goes to our current condition in the classroom, in which people believe, disabled students to learn optimally.  Based on the talk of Dr. Eleanore Hargreaves, there are several reasons why our current classroom's condition in Indonesia might refrain students from learning effectively. The reasons are it installs fear in students; it refrains student from autonomy; it reinforces coercive act. 

Firstly, fear is the main blockade of brain running process. Based on the research conducted by Dr. Eleanore Hargreaves in Palestinian school and Britain, it shows the same result that when the students are scared their brain will shut down. Every material that is given couldn't be digested. No matter who are the students, where are they come from, installing fear in class will refrain students from memorizing and understanding. In the other hand, Hargreaves suggests that when the classes are safe and comfortable, it will be easier for the students to process the learning. 

Secondly, our current classrooms don't support students' autonomy. Based on the talk given by Hargreaves in 'Future of Education', she described that people learning process are affected by their own purposes. She argues that learning process will be run effectively when the students understand their reason to learn. It will be wasteful if the students don't find any connections between the learning materials and their own purposes of learning. For example, some students are forced to learn calculus even though, their passion is in far different kind of field such as art, linguistics or even in psychology in which calculus relatively doesn't apply. In the end, not only that the learning process would be ineffective,  but the teaching process would also be wasteful. Meanwhile, If the learning process is related, it will dramatically boost the effectiveness of learning. That is the reason why Hargreaves suggests us to rethink our education systems and if possible to open more rooms for students autonomy in choosing their own subjects and teachers, as well as the ability to give feedback to the schools. 

The last but not least, is how our classroom still reinforces coercive act. This point is very related to the first point. We can't deny that one of the main reason for why our students are scared is because we tend to use coercive act, in order to make the classroom discipline. Some might use a light coercive version of the act but some others go to the extent of using physical punishment. In one of the schools that I used to be taught, there is this one teacher that always bring big sticks around in order to silence the noisy classrooms. It is an act that all of us regret to hear about. But the reality is that in most of the Indonesian classrooms still value silence and obedience too much. With only one teacher to teach forty students, the teacher has limited choice in how to make sure the silence and discipline are rooted in the class. One of the way, physical punishment, is one that we regret the most.

The three reasons above are what stop our students to learn optimally. In order to withstand the impact, all of education's elements need to work together to build a comfortable classroom that will make the students feel safe and at ease in learning.  A classroom that promotes independent where the students can choose their subjects, teachers, and majors. A classroom that supports the students by giving encouragement and empathy. In hope, that in the long run, that kind of classrooms will produce the top-notch kind of people. The people who will make the high cost of education worth the fight.