An education ministry decision to dumb down grade school is a mistake
for the future
My daughter, who just turned 4,
currently has three favorite subjects in the various books we put in her hands.
First there are dinosaurs, which she is able to name and roughly classify. Then
there is the human body. She knows about cells, muscles, bones and organs. She
seems to understand the brain, digestion and the fact that DNA — “It’s ladder-shaped
daddy” — carries the code that determines how we look and grow. The latest is
space and constellations, planets, the Milky Way and stars. She knows that
outer space is weightless and draws her own version of the planets orbiting the
sun.
This is not to say that my little
girl is anything other than reasonably bright, but I am struck that she finds
these scientific subjects fun and interesting — and she is two years away from
entering first grade. She knows things I doubt I knew at her age and she is
constantly eager for more — when she isn’t throwing a fit or drawing on the
walls with crayons, of course.
This is just one reason I found
the recent announcement from the Indonesian Ministry of Education and Culture
so hard to understand. The ministry is intent on stripping the lower elementary
curriculum of social science, natural science and English in favor of
nationalism, religion and character-building. PDI-P lawmaker Dedi Gumelar said
the change would nurture a “motherland-loving attitude” while critics see it as
another example of the many obstacles Indonesia faces on the road to
sustainable prosperity.
“In elementary school we need to
teach them more about good character, the values of state ideology Pancasila,
culture, and ethics,” Dedi said recently. I might recommend that Dedi visit
science-mad South Korea, one of the most nationalistic places on earth, where
kids are awash in science and English from the day they enter the classroom
because the society equates knowledge with nation building.
There is nothing more important
to developing a robust economy than education, including an early appreciation
for science, languages and technology. It is well understood that Indonesia
lacks investment in research and development and that most technology is
imported. Companies here are steeped in a culture of quick return that leaves
little room for investment in long-term research.
The government has said it will
spend an impressive $34.9 billion on education in the 2013 state budget, an
increase of 6.7 percent over 2012.But is it being spent wisely to give
Indonesia the punch it needs to compete with the rest of Asia? There is so much
to be done. The Trade Ministry has said there are only a paltry 20,000 PhDs in
the country. In the latest ranking of the world’s best universities by the
London Times not a single Indonesian institution placed in the top 400. In the
prestigious US News and World Report rankings of universities in Asia, the best
Indonesia managed was No. 50 for the University of Indonesia.
I had a conversation recently
with a senior executive of a major multinational company. He praised
Indonesia’s prospects in the context of Asia’s overall rise. Then I asked if
his company had plans for operations here beyond sales and marketing. He said
no. Those investments were all in India and China and included research and
development centers employing many thousands of workers. The problem in
Indonesia, he explained, was that there was not a large enough pool of trained
engineers and scientists to draw from.
Building pride in the nation and
reinvigorating the values of tolerance in the Pancasila ideology are certainly
good things but they are hardly incompatible with exposing young minds to the
scientific method. Indeed, the children of the wealthy will likely learn more
sophisticated subjects because they will go to international schools and be
groomed for study abroad. It would be a tragedy if the great majority of
children, who rely on government schools, are short-changed by their curriculum.
A child is never too young to explore the boundaries of science and to dream of
what might be. You can ask my daughter.
Lin Neumann
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