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| Inspirational Story in Teaching in 3T Areas |
Feminist Society - The quote “everyone is a teacher and every place is a school” may aptly describe what Ikrar Aruming Wilujeng — a pengajar muda at the Indonesia Mengajar program who dedicates herself to teach children in the 3T (Tertinggal, Terdepan, and Terluar) area, is doing. Ikrar was placed in Kampung Menarbu, Roon District, Telok Wondama Regency, West Papua.
During the assignment period, Ikrar
has been seeing directly the educational problems that exist in the assignment
area. One of them is the condition in which students often skip school because they
go with their parents during working. It brought Ikrar to an extraordinary
idea, instead of forcing students to come to school, Ikrar came up with the
solution of bringing the school (learning to teach activity) to where the
students were. Ikrar believes that the essence of learning is not that we
should go to school buildings or wear school uniforms, but rather how people
can learn and get access of education. It prompted Ikrar to hold a class far
away on the beach of Rowor (where the student's parents worked) with the aim
that the students could continue learning.
What Ikrar did is an image of an
unsung hero who not only pays attention to education but also participates
directly in the efforts to advance Indonesian education. Ikrar’s passion for
education has been ingrained in her even since childhood when she sat in a
primary school through her father who was an education consultant at that time
serving in Papua and her mother who was a volunteer teacher. A life attached to
education from a young age is what makes Ikrar want to dedicate herself to
teaching.
Before attending the Indonesia Mengajar
program, Ikrar was an assistant professor at Universitas Islam Indonesia and
Universitas Widya Mataram. At the time of becoming an assistant professor, Ikrar
was pretty much dealing with students from the 3T areas. At that point, Ikrar began
to realize firsthand that there was such a lame literacy gap between those from
3T areas and those from urban backgrounds who were supported with adequate
access to education since they were children. That triggered Ikrar to join the Indonesia
Mengajar program in order to be able to see firsthand the condition of children
in remote areas and to be able to help reach out for efforts to enlighten the
life of the nation as stated in the Preamble of the 1945 Constitution.
In joining the Indonesia Mengajar
program, Ikrar had to go through a long and not-easy selection process that took
about 4 to 5 months. Initially, Ikrar had to go through the administrative
stages that must complete the dossier, after which Ikrar had to go through the
stages of creating an essay and answer a series of questions. After going
through the process, Ikrar’s journey was not finished, Ikrar still had to make
a program plan. Where the remaining registrants were given a case study
relating to an issue in the placement area, then they were required to resolve
the issue with a program plan they had created. After qualifying in those
stages, Ikrar must pass through an online direct assessment stage where the
remaining participants discussed via Zoom Meeting to discuss the program plans
they had created. When completing these stages, Ikrar still had to go through
offline stages such as interviews, psychological tests, and assessments to
conduct persuasive communication with stakeholders.
You can also read: Emanuella Malonda's Steep Journey in Fighting for Women's Rights: A Feminist Activist Who Struggles to Fight Against Intimidation
After going through such a long
selection process, Ikrar was finally able to qualify as one of the 33 people
who were selected as the pengajar muda in the Indonesia Mengajar program. All
33 chosen people were then arranged to be placed in the assignment area. Where
the placement of pengajar muda was based on the needs of the village and the
criteria of each pengajar muda that had been assessed during the training
period. During the assignment period, besides teaching, Ikrar and other
pengajar muda also have a mission to be able to find educational actors in the
area with whom they can cooperate and network together to support and develop
education in the assignment area. There are five parties that are the direct
partners of pengajar muda during the assignment period, namely student’s
parents, teachers, principals, the community, and the government.
During her assignment in Kampung
Menarbu, Ikrar saw many educational problems. In terms of teaching process,
phenomena such as the presence of teachers but no schools or phenomena where
there are schools but inactive teachers are actually common. The lack of
guaranteed teacher welfare often makes teachers inactive in teaching because
they have to work in the fields to meet their daily needs that cannot be
covered by their income as teachers who receive less attention. This condition used
to make Ikrar to teach and handle students at school alone.
Meanwhile, from the student's
perspective, there are also various problems and challenges. In addition to the
condition of skipping school because of the reason of following parents to
work, there is also a very concerning problem of access to school. There are
still children whose distance from their homes to school must take a full day.
This condition forces them not to be able to go to school.
Therefore, in carrying out her
duties and networking, every effort and dedication made by Ikrar as a pengajar
muda, no matter how small, is always considered meaningful. Even something as
simple as being able to encourage teachers to come to school to teach or as
simple as being able to convince parents to allow their children to go to
school is considered an extraordinary achievement.
Ikrar's story and experience are
proof of how important a program like Indonesia Mengajar is to support efforts
to equalize education in Indonesia. Hopefully, Ikrar can be an example for all
of us to take part in efforts to improve education in Indonesia. As simple as
creating a safe and comfortable space for children to learn and develop
themselves is more than enough. We can move to carry out similar teaching
programs based on communities or individuals in our environment. We can also
contribute directly by joining the Indonesia Mengajar program which is
routinely opened every year and can be registered for those who meet the
requirements such as having completed a bachelor's degree, not married, and
under 30 years old. In addition, we can also contribute indirectly through
Iuran Publik Indonesia Mengajar as a communal movement Where the public can
donate through the indonesiamengajar.org/iuran page as an official channel
where people can donate to support the Indonesia Mengajar program and give
birth to other Ikrars.
In that session, we agreed on two
things. First, Feminist Society will continue to support social movements that
aim to benefit the surrounding, such as efforts to promote educational progress
through teaching programs and human empowerment. Second, we agreed to continue
to coordinate and collaborate in the future in advocacy and education efforts.
Programs like Indonesia Mengajar
are also one of the factors that motivate Feminist Society to hold the Feminist
Society Mengajar Program in rural areas in several provinces in Indonesia which
has been running for the past few months.
If you have any case related to
gender equality or feminist issues and you need either advocacy assistance,
counseling, support for campaign media, or some kind of that, feel free to
contact us by this section. All of those things are free, you do not need to
pay anything, it is our commitment to promote progress in gender equality and
women’s rights through education and advocacy.
You can also contact us on:
Instagram : @feministsociety.id
Email : fem.official7@gmail.com
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