Kennial Caroline Laia, Jakarta – Proponents of religious schooling are clamoring for a larger slice of the public education budget, even as government struggles to fund secular state schools.
"Islamic schools play an important role in increasing education participation among students and awareness among their families to go to school," Phil Kamaruddin, secretary of the Directorate of Islamic Education at the Ministry of Religious Affairs argued earlier this week.
"Pesantren for instance, have a large potential to contribute to reducing the illiteracy rate in Indonesia," Phil said, referring to traditional Islamic boarding schools.
He said pesantren, and madrasah, which are day-only and are often more modern, have both made a great contribution to the number of Indonesians who go to school. "However, many of these privately funded Islamic schools have poor facilities," he said.
"The development needed includes infrastructure refinement and higher budget allocation for educational materials, especially in the more remote parts of the archipelago," he said. "That is why the government should help to develop them. They need to be revitalized," he said.
While the contribution of pesantren to providing basic education cannot be denied, Australian academic Greg Fealy argues that Islamic parties, notably the United Development Party (PPP), have a political interest in securing funding for schools with informal ties to Islamic parties.
"PPP made extensive use of the patronage opportunities that came through its two cabinet members, Religious Affairs Minister Suryadharma Ali and Public Housing Minister Djan Faridz," Greg wrote in an article published Monday on Australian National University website New Mandela.
"Both ministries poured vast sums of money into the Islamic education and social service system, ensuring the support of thousands of grateful local Islamic scholars and leaders."
With secular education overseen by the education ministry, and the religious affairs ministry in charge of Islamic schools and universities, the question is whether there are two separate education budget pies, or one. Will a boost for Islamic education mean less funding for the secular state school system?
An answer may be found in comments earlier this month by Amich Alhumami, head of the National Development Planning Agency (Bappenas).
Amich said a team at the agency had prepared the National Medium-Term Development Plan for the education sector, which will be included in policy submitted for approval by the next president.
Amich said Bappenas would aim for more attention, and presumably funding, to be directed to pesantren and other Islamic schools.
"The focus on research is on how to develop Islamic schools," Amich said. "Islamic education is not under the Ministry of Education and Culture. That is why we need to conduct research on Islamic education," he said. "Pesantren and madrasah have potential and we are hoping this program would be able to help," he said.
Meanwhile, the EU- and Australia-funded Analytical and Capacity Development Partnership, which works in collaboration with Bappenas and both the ministries of education and religious affairs, recently held a discussion at which research to boost Islamic education policy was endorsed.
"Through this research, we are hoping that the government will pay more attention to Islamic education," the religious affairs ministry's Phil said.
Source: http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/news/attention-funding-turns-islamic-education-system-new-govt-plans/