An official evaluation of the transfer of the management of senior high schools and vocational schools (SMA/SMK) from city/regency administrations to provincial governments has not been made available. However, in the second month of the management transfer, various problems have appeared.
The most serious one deals with teachers, not only because of their strategic positions as educators and as humans whose dignity needs to be respected, but also because the problem involves a professional issue that has never been properly addressed.
Statements by the acting general chairperson of the Indonesian Teachers Association, Unifah Rosyidi, (Kompas, 2/2) are not only a reminder but reality. Among other problems, there has been no technical instruction issued to prevent a collision between the law on regional government and the law on the transfer of SMA/SMK management.
A technical instruction constitutes a reference and standard for the operation of the provincial administration. With one, the transfer of management could be undertaken immediately. Various problems experienced by teachers, such as their status, quality improvement, numbers and compensation, have to be settled in a planned, systematic and structured way.
The first problem involving teachers is about data. In reality, their recorded numbers and the amount of their compensation do not match with the facts in the field, both for those with the status of civil servants and those who are contract workers. Nor is their competence measured accurately.
Problems concerning teachers are never treated seriously. Claims that teachers are the key to education are just propaganda and are never taken seriously. Teachers are always the last to be considered, even in the SMA/SMK management transfer, which started in January 2017.
Several problems in the teaching profession have been resolved. Teachers can be delegated to positions without reference to political interests and contract teachers can be sent to places that are short of teachers.
The transfer of SMA/SMK management is about moving responsibility as well as authority and the management of the education praxis as well as the budget. The transfer is done gradually while carrying out the job. Education is about preparing the next generation and its results are only seen in following decades. It means it should not be treated as a toy, let alone as a tool for political interests.
