The Government Must Improve Coordination Before Reopening Schools

Illustrations (Photo: Ivan Aleksic, Unsplash)

JAKARTA - The discourse of a number of local governments, especially the DKI Jakarta Provincial Government regarding the scenario of opening schools for student teaching and learning activities for the 2020-2021 school year amid the COVID-19 pandemic has drawn criticism.

The Federation of Indonesian Teachers' Unions (FSGI) asked the government not to recklessly decide to reopen schools, even though these schools are only in the green zone of COVID-19.

Deputy Secretary General of FSGI, Satriwan Salim, assessed that the coordination of the central and regional governments must be improved. This is because the coordination between central and regional governments or vice versa is not good. This can be seen from the handling of social assistance (bansos) to the community.

It is feared that coordination will not run again if later dealing with schools that are opened for learning activities during the corona virus outbreak. As a result, the spread of the virus is increasingly spreading among students.

"The central and local governments must improve their coordination, communication and data collection. Is one area really safe from the spread of COVID-19 or not," Satriawan told reporters, Sunday, May 17.

"Do not let it be because of poor data collection, after entering school in July, students and teachers will become victims of COVID-19. The risk is too great," he continued.

Therefore, Satriawan asked students to still be allowed to study at home at the start of the new school year in July, both online and offline.

As long as that is done, the government must improve services, teacher competence in managing learning, and support internet access. The government must also prepare guidelines for the student orientation period (MOS) by adjusting home learning activities and COVID-19 prevention protocols.

"Distance learning could be the best option for the next semester, or at least until the COVID-19 curve really slopes, taking into account input from health experts," said Satriawan.

As is known, the DKI Provincial Government has prepared a number of alternative teaching and learning activities when students enter the new academic year in July starting from the introduction of the school environment (MPLS).

The first scenario is to open a part of the school and hold learning activities in the school by all students. Second, opening a part of the school and learning activities at the school are carried out by some students. Third, open all schools but some students are allowed to study from home.

This school opening scenario is considered in accordance with the mapping of areas that are the green zones of COVID-19. Meanwhile, schools that are in the red zone of COVID-19 or areas with high virus transmission are not considered to be opened.

"We have to look at the map of the school location with the distribution of COVID-19. In Jakarta, there are red zones and green zones. For example, in Rorotan there has not been any COVID detected at all. The place is clean, so there is no problem," said DKI Jakarta Governor Anies. Baswedan.

Then, Anies also asked the DKI Education Agency to ensure the readiness of schools and teachers to be able to implement COVID-19 prevention protocols in schools, such as personal protective equipment such as masks, sterilizing classrooms, and encouraging students to wash their hands frequently with soap.