Discourse On Free Private Schools In Jakarta, Hopefully Not Populist Policy

A number of people held peaceful demonstrations during driving-free days to voice that school fees were borne by the government, according to the mandate of the 1945 Constitution. (Ist)

JAKARTA The plan for free private schools for elementary, junior high and high school levels in Jakarta has become a hot topic of conversation lately. Ubaid Matraji, Coordinator of the Indonesian Education Monitoring Network (JPPI), emphasized that the cost of education is clearly the responsibility of the government because it is stated in the 1945 Constitution.

The DKI Jakarta DPRD has agreed that public, and private schools will be free of charge, aka free starting from the upcoming 2025/2026 school year. This was marked by a memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between the Acting Governor of DKI Jakarta Teguh Setyabudi and the Chairman of the DKI Jakarta DPRD Khoirudin along with three other representatives, namely Ima Mahdiah, Rany Mauliani, and Basri Baco.

"It has been agreed in the future, free schools for private public schools," said Khourudin, quoted from the official website of the DKI Jakarta DPRD, Monday (4/11/2024). Khoirudin explained that the signing of this MoU is a form of commitment to ensure that every budget allocation is in line with the vision and mission of the local government, and answers the needs of the community.

Free schools, both private and public, have long been the dream of the community for a long time. The hope that free private schools will increase as new student admissions or PPDB implements a zoning system since 2017.

Prospective students who are not accepted at public schools are forced to continue their schools to the private sector at quite expensive costs. In fact, according to the National Coordinator of JPPI Ubaid Matraji, school fees in Indonesia are still a burden on the community's economy. Even the main cause of students dropping out of school is dominated by economic factors.

According to the National Socio-Economic Survey or Susenas from the Central Statistics Agency (BPS) 2021, 76 percent of families admit their children have dropped out of school for economic reasons. Of this figure, most (67 percent) were unable to pay tuition fees, while the rest, 8.7 percent, were forced to earn a living.

Research on the 2023 Indonesian Survey Flow (ASI) also stated the same thing. In the study, it was stated that there were three main problems faced by residents, namely the high cost of basic necessities (23.4 percent), expensive education costs (20.1 percent), and difficult to find jobs (18.6 percent).

Even from JPPI data from January 2022 to June 2024, there were 1,479 educational cases related to the burden of the family's economic costs. The highest case of 41 percent was a certificate of being detained at school because he was unable to pay off arrears.

Ubaid said that the detention of diplomas did not only occur in private schools, but was also found in public schools.

Next is the case of dropping out of school because they do not have a fee of 27 percent, parents of students are entangled in online loans to cover school fees (18 percent), cannot take exams because they have not paid school bills (9 percent), and also found cases of children who were victims of bullying and intimidation at school because they did not pay fees (5 percent).

Ubaid regrets that economic factors are still one of the reasons why people have difficulty accessing education. In fact, free schools are a mandate from Article 31 of the 1945 Constitution which states that every citizen is entitled to education, and the government is obliged to pay for it.

"The mandate of this constitution is reaffirmed in Article 34 of the National Education System Law, that local governments and governments guarantee the implementation of education without charge," said Ubaid.

National Coordinator of the Education and Teacher Association (P2G) Satriwan Salim appreciated the discourse of free private schools. However, he hopes that the government must guarantee that free private schools have good quality, ranging from teachers to their facilities and infrastructure.

"The policy of eliminating public and private schools in Jakarta should be appreciated, even though this is a popular policy," said Satriwan when contacted by VOI.

"But everything must be guaranteed, so it's not just a free school. Starting from the teacher must be competent, facilities and infrastructure, and a good learning environment," he added.

Still said Satriwan, the government also needs to clarify the criteria for free private schools so as not to confuse the public. He explained, sociologically private schools are divided into three caste. The first is elite private schools at very expensive costs, the second is middle class private, and the last is financially problematic private schools.

"The third is usually the teacher's salary is not feasible, even under the UMP, inadequate facilities, and so on. So which one wants to be free of charge?" said Satriwan.

Terkait itu, Pelaksana Tugas (Plt) Kepala Dinas Pendidikan DKI Jakarta Purwosusilo menuturkan bahwa program sekolah swasta gratis tidak hanya bebas Donasi Pembinaan Pendidikan (SPP), uang balik dan uang masuk saat pendaftaran, tetapi juga kebutuhan peralatan pelajar.

However, not all private schools in Jakarta will be free of charge by the government. Private schools in Jakarta have been mapped based on quality and costs with a level or cluster scheme from clusters one to five.

Private schools that will be targeted by the government for free private school programs, said Purwosusilo, are clusters one to three. While clusters four and five are considered as elite private schools that are not included in this program.

Despite these doubts, Satriwan agreed that free private schools could be a solution to limited seats in public schools. The phenomenon of fighting over seats in public schools occurs due to discrepancies between the number of students and schools.

According to Satriwan, the number of public schools in Indonesia is generally like a pyramid, the higher the level, the smaller the number.

"This is one solution to overcome the limitations of seats. But with the guarantee that teachers in private schools must be of high quality. Due to the fact, the quality of teachers is always correlated with the welfare of the teacher itself," said Satriawan.