EDUCATION FOR ALL

After more than a year, a teachers union and a coalition of several NGOs
have won their fight againts the international-standard school pilot project
(RSBI). The constitutional court declared on Tuesday that the RSBI program
breached the constitution for discrimination and segregating students.
Although the ruling immediately received and exuberant welcome
nationwide, it does not amount to a victory for the students, the core subject of
education. They have instead fallen victim to uncertainties that have been
plaguing the national edecation system asa result of never-ending squabling
between policymakers and bureaucrats that resulted in judicial intervention.
The debate has denied, if not revoked, educational autonomy, which
ironically has been acknowledged by Law No. 20/2003 on education the legal
basis of the RSBI program.
Article 50 of the education law says that every regency or city should
have at least one RSBI school. As of 2012, around 1,300. RSBI schools operate
throughout the country.
Since their inception in 2007, the schools have drawns criticsm on the
grounds that they were funded by the state while denying seats to students who
could not afford to pay their high tuition fees. For many, the RSBI system only
exacerbated the so-called liberalization of the national education system, which
has been characterized by a mushrooming number of schools that boast.
international or national plus curriculums just to attrack students.
The RSBI program, which was originally aimed at helping indonesian
students close the gap with their countrparts in developed countrie in terms of
quality, has resulted in the creation of elite schools, whose students enjoy better
facilities and are taught by better teachers than those in ordinary schools.
Although the law requires the international-standardschool allocate 20 percent
of their seats for poor students, few underprivileged students attend RSBI shools
in practice.
For policymakers then, the RSBI program was a short cut to preparing
the high-quality human resources that the nation needs to survive fierce
competition in the global market. RSBI school differ from the other schools due
to their use of English as a medium of instruction and to the aoption of an

international curriculum. Specifically, the RSBI curriculum reference those in

place in OECD countries.
In his defense of the RSBI program, then education minister Bambang
Sudibyo Said that education was indeed costly. He asserted that only countries
that charged high tuition fees. Such as the US, produced high-qualitystudents.
The constitutional court might be right in dissolving the RSBI program,
particulary because in contributed littleto improving national education, as
evident in the OECDs Program the International Students Assessment (PISA)
in 2010, which ranked Indonesian students lower than those in China and
Thailand in science, reading and math.
If RSBI envisions making a quantum leap in Indonesian education, it
deserves support from the whole nation. The problem, however, seems to be in
implementation. The RSBI program has been managed in such a way that
money matters the most.
Former education minister Daoed Joesoef said that the RSBI was flawed
because it blindly copies foreign curriculums without understanding the concept
of eduction in developed countries. The educational system in the US and the
UK is superior not because of their use of English, but due to their respect for
science.
The Constitutional courts ruling should therefore inspire policymakers
to reinforcethe role of teachers as the leading player in national education, as
they know what their students need.