BOOSTING students in the particular context would probably be destructing their mind. It has been happening today since Ministry of Education and Culture, Muhadjir Effendy, announced that pupils should be in school for eight hours.
This sort of decision emerges in our society, particularly in social media, as a current and hot issue, in which most people are separated in two views: pros and cons. Effendy has won due to bringing polemical and controversial discourse.
It is started by the degradation moral brought by pupils and in fact it makes the clash of schools. This classical problem actually has occurred since our students have certain outside group.
Thereafter they want to be a hero and legitimate as a youngsters, even though by making riots, either individual or group. This kind of symptom could be recognized as a psychological aspect that is common in young people (12-19 years old).
The pivotal problem is can we categorize them as uneducated persons and blame because of their inclination? Comparing with those aspects is naive and would be irrelevant. Students, on the other hand, are unique and tend to do something inappropriately, while managing them in school until afternoon is an idea that requires evaluations.
In the context of formal education, creativity is the substance of learning; therefore, full day school will alienate them in the real society. This last point is a crucial value which is forgotten by modern education paradigm.
Take an example if our students are focusing on cognitive aspect and rejecting affective dimension; are they going to be intellectual?
Full day school perspective, more or less, has abolished that first side and towards “theoretical-theory” just because in the 21st century where globalization needs persons who are knowledgeable.
Hence, it refers to those who are interested in theory without practice and full day school actually covers learning by listening in the class.
Paulo Freire wrote in his book, Pedagogy Oppressed (1972), that education should be covering empirical skills in society and the key of that is doing something. That is not merely reading a book, but also extending our relationship to others.
It does not mean that we do not have to use textbooks, however we have to balance between book and practice. Does tackling global problems, undoubtedly, need both? We cannot choose the first one or emphasize it as the highest rather than the other. In other words, we need equality and equity.
Freedom of Expression
We have endeavored to find out our lack of education system previously and the next question is how to deal with it? This query is simple but it is hard to get a straight answer due to those variables, which is around it, are complex.
Nonetheless, we can start from what the purpose of education is. We have to be aware that education is a weapon to guide us to find ourselves as a human being. That tendency is an essence of contemporary education perspective that we need today.
That weapon, however, does not shoot proper object, thus, it has changed and been created by political interest—the man behind the gun or we can say decision maker in one hand and national curriculum on the other side.
Moreover, the most important thing, beyond those aspects, is trend issues which happen in the world. It is based on economic and politic atmosphere. That trans-national issue has been influencing stabilization among countries, including Indonesia as a part of ASEAN.
Learning process in school should be educating pupils focusing on—at least—two aspects, e.g. talent and social skills. At the first point, students who are interested in arts, shall take art class and teacher has to guide them until they achieve it.
This would be extremely significant rather than they just learn from other lessons. If we contextualize that certain case in full day school, probably they could not express their bent comprehensively. Is it the purpose of our education?
Another pivotal problem, besides talent facet, is uniqueness brought by every child. They have their own way to upgrade their hard and soft skills, therefore, teacher must approach them in the certain context.
Without creativity in teaching, it is impossible to create and construct educational situation, particularly inside and outside the class. We have to remember that education involves cross settings where learning activity takes place.
Full day school, thereby, is a decision that requires feedback and evaluations from the practitioners, considering those arguments which has been mentioned above.
Rony K. Pratama
The Writer is a Researcher at the Education Literacy Movement, Yogyakarta
