Jarod - The Heir of Thunder

This is the comic character that I have been developing for years. Unfortunately I never have time to really finish it. Oh BTW his name is Jarod. It derives from the word Jarot which means nucleus in Javanese.

Though his name was taken from Javanese word, the story was actually inspired by a legend in my family that originates from North Sumatra. Through out generation, we were advised not to swear on our offspring by the name of thunder. We were told that it would happen instantly because our ancestor, Balige Raja, once defeated the thunder in a fight. The thunder had sworen to obey whatever commanded by the offsprings of my ancestor.

We were also told that the earliest of our ancestor was a wise woman. She had talked a tiger into giving up its anger towards the villagers of Kampong Sihombing. She was the only one who knew the reason why that tiger was in rage. The tiger had also sworn to obey her offspring.

With these two legend, I created Jarod who commands tigers and thunder. Sounds like my imaginary life, isn't it?

Disaster Recovery Planning for Schools

After the tsunami that struck Aceh and its surroundings, I put this ideas into writing. This writing is mainly based on my experience as Business System Recovery Planner in Nestle Indonesia.

It is based on the idea that "Disaster is unavoidable, but it is not new",therefore we can predict its impacts and minimize the risk. Though i wrote many issues, I tried to emphasize on adaptive curriculum that adapts its content according to the development of the people in the school's surroundings.

Enjoy Reading,
Jaha

Pemulihan sekolah di daerah bencana

Ketika kutu milenium datang, dunia bisnis telah siaga menyambutnya. Kutu milenium (millennium bug Y2K) diramalkan menjadi bencana bagi dunia terutama karena semua kegiatan di dunia akan terhenti akibat mogoknya komputer-komputer pengendali dunia. Disaster Recovery Planning atau Perencanaan Pemulihan Paska Bencana (P3B) menjadi buah bibir di setiap perusahaan. Pada saat itu banyak P3B dibangun bahkan dengan asumsi yang lebih luas yaitu bencana alam. Dunia bisnis begitu siapnya karena P3B merupakan hajat hidup orang banyak. Namun ketika bencana menimpa sekolah, Departemen Pendidikan Nasional atau pun sekolah tidak memiliki prosedur Perencanaan Pemulihan Paska Bencana.

Bencana dikategorikan sebagai Force Major karena kedatangan dan dampaknya sering tidak dapat diramalkan. Meski kedatangannya belum dapat diramalkan, tetapi dampaknya adalah keterhentian sebuah kegiatan akibat berbagai pranata pendukung kegiatan tersebut yang rusak. Pranata pendukung ini tentunya tidak hanya yang berwujud tetapi juga pranata yang tidak berwujud seperti, dalam konteks sekolah, kesiapan mental murid untuk masuk kembali sekolah.

P3B berperan dalam menjembatani kegiatan yang terhenti dan pranata yang rusak agar dapat berfungsi lagi. Di samping itu P3B juga berperan menjembatani kondisi yang tidak normal dengan kondisi normal. Di sini artinya ukuran-ukuran kondisi normal tidak akan dapat berlaku pada keadaan sekolah paska bencana. Oleh karena itu dalam P3B, perlu sebuah ukuran-ukuran yang mampu menyesuaikan diri pada kondisi sekolah hingga kondisi paska bencana berangsur-angsur normal. Sekedar catatan, pada kondisi bencana yang meluluhlantakkan seluruh pranata sekolah, membangun sekolah kembali kepada kondisi normal merupakan sebuah upaya sia-sia. Akan lebih baik bila sekolah dibangun kembali dengan memperhatikan isyu-isyu gender dan lingkungan yang akan sedikit dijabarkan di bawah ini.

Pada kasus bencana di Aceh dan Nias, banyak bangunan sekolah yang rata dengan tanah dan brain drain atau pengurasan kecendekiaan akibat berkurangnya jumlah guru secara drastis akibat bencana alam. Lebih jauh lagi, anak-anak mengalami trauma akan bencana sehingga banyak anak menjadi tidak siap sekolah tidak hanya karena masalah kesiapan keuangan tetapi juga masalah kesiapan jiwa.

Membangun wujud bangunan sekolah tentunya mudah. Kalangan militer telah menunjukkan kepiawaiannya dalam membangun kembali pranata masyarakat, terutama sekolah. Seorang teman pernah mengacungkan jempol dan berucap bahwa ia akhirnya merasa bangga melihat militer yang sungguh sigap dan tanpa lelah membantu rakyat. Sekolah-sekolah darurat yang baru dibangun ini kurang memperhatikan perihal keadilan gender seperti jumlah kamar kecil untuk murid dan guru perempuan. Sudah seyogyanya jumlah kamar mandi untuk perempuan lebih banyak dari jumlah kamar mandi untuk laki-laki karena, dalam waktu penggunaan kamar mandi, perempuan lebih banyak menghabiskan waktu dari pada rata-rata yang digunakan laki-laki.

Isyu lain yang menarik diterapkan di sekolah paska bencana adalah perihal “Rute Aman ke Sekolah” (Road Safety to School) yang dicanangkan WHO, Organisasi Kesehatan Dunia, pada hari Kesehatan Dunia tanggal 7 April 2004. Menurut data WHO, setiap tahun 180.000 anak di bawah 15 tahun terbunuh dalam kecelakaan di jalanan. Upaya menciptakan lingkungan aman ke sekolah bukanlah masalah transportasi, demikian menurut Dr. Lee Jong-Wook, direktur umum WHO, tetapi merupakan masalah kesehatan masyarakat. Bagi Indonesia, tentunya masalahnya menjadi lebih kompleks karena juga melibatkan masalah kondisi perilaku sosial masyarakat di jalanan. Sering kita lihat bahwa anak-anak menjadi prioritas terbawah bagi supir-supir angkutan karena mereka membayar di bawah tarif umum. Di samping itu, sering pula kita mendengar kasus di mana anak-anak sekolah yang dimintai uang oleh preman dalam perjalanan ke sekolah. Sungguh saat yang tepat untuk membangun sekolah yang lebih baik dengan memperhatikan isyu-isyu baru di dunia saat sekolah luluh lantak oleh bencana. Khususnya pada kasus Aceh, akan sangat memungkin bagi Aceh melakukan salah satu rekomendasi Kampanye “Rute aman ke sekolah”, yaitu mengurangi rute ke sekolah yang terekspos lalu lintas jalan raya.

Mengenai mengisi kekosongan kecendekiaan akibat pengurasan kecendekiaan paska bencana, pemerintah perlu menyiapkan sebuah sistem pendukung relawan di daerah bencana. Pemerintah dapat juga memberi insentif berupa potongan pajak buat pihak swasta yang membiayai guru-guru untuk datang ke daerah bencana, misalnya. Guru-guru yang menjadi relawan perlu diberikan beasiswa untuk bersekolah lebih lanjut paska pelayanannya di daerah bencana tersebut. Dengan demikian pranata sekolah akan berangsur-angsur pulih.

Yang paling penting dalam P3B bagi sekolah adalah membangun kurikulum yang yang adaptif. Seperti diungkapkan di atas, ukuran-ukuran normal tidak dapat diterapkan untuk pada sekolah-sekolah paska bencana. Pencapaian sekolah di daerah bencana bukan pada jumlah murid-murid yang masuk ke sekolah negeri lanjutannya. Ukuran kemajuan sekolah sebagai bagian dari kurikulum yang adaptif harus mampu berubah-ubah berangsur-angsur sesuai dengan perkembangan keadaan sekeliling paska bencana. Pada tahap awal, kurikulum yang dibangun ditujukan untuk membantu murid-murid mengatasi trauma. Tentunya ukuran kemajuan sekolah adalah jumlah murid yang telah mengatasi trauma-nya. Pada periode berikutnya, kurikulum perlu dikembangkan agar murid dapat menjadi bagian masyarakat yang membantu lingkungannya melewati masa trauma, dan seterusnya hingga keseluruhan sistem berjalan kembali menjadi normal.

Seperti pepatah, “Tidak ada hal baru di bawah matahari ini”, Bencana alam dan P3B tentunya bukan hal yang baru. Sesungguhnya kita hanya perlu sebuah langkah untuk memulai perjalanan kita yang panjang memulihkan sekolah di daerah bencana, dan P3B untuk sekolah adalah langkah itu.

Jaha Nababan, lulusan Boston University School of Education, adalah Fulbright Grantee dan Kelly Scholar yang mengajar di FISIP UI. Pernah mendesain P3B untuk sebuah perusahaan multinasional asing.

Revolutionizing technology in schools

This is the earliest of my writing seasons. I wrote this a few months before i started this blog. Well, consider this as premium version of this blog because you are about to hear my very first thought about empowering schools in Indonesia.

Enjoy reading,
Jaha

Revolutionizing technology in schools

Every culture must negotiate with technology, especially schools. The school may try to deny its existence or to acquire technology blindly in the case. The struggle of negotiating with technology has been around for thousand of years. Neil Postman of New York University described about King Thamus of Upper Egypt who entertained Theuth, God of invention. Thamus entertained every Theuth's inventions except when Theuth invented writings for the Egyptians. Thamus was afraid that "those who acquire it, will cease to exercise their memory and become forgetful." We all know that it is not true. We see that writings have revolutionized how knowledge is distributed.

It appears that school shares the same perception as Thamus had. Thomas Alva Edison once claimed that educational films would replace books in schools in the future. We are his future and we have not seen it happens, even in his homeland, America. Seymour Papert of Massachusetts Institute of Technology said similar things that computer would revolutionize schools. We will see it then.

To see how school perceives technology, we must go back in time to see what formed its perception. Indonesia does not have long educational technology history and therefore, let us learn from the American educational technology history. Larry Cuban of Stanford University did two research projects and wrote two books about how technology implementation at schools works. In his books - written in 1986 and 2001 - he consistently states how teacher feels about television and computers in schools. Cuban said that there is a cycle of technology implementation in schools. The cycle started with euphoria in implementing technology in schools. The next stage come in the cycle is the scientific credibility about how school can benefit from technology. But then there is growing frustration about technology because technology is imperfect. It cannot blend impeccably to life because it lacks of standard. At the final cycle, who gets all the blame? The teacher, who is the most important element in designing and operating the process in the implementation, gets the blame. However, they were left out when the decision of implementing the technology was made.

We can see the impact on Indonesia in terms of wasted financial resources; time; and disappointment. Look at our educational television. TPI who was founded in January 1991, betrayed it supporters such as PUSTEKKOM and the stake holders by changing its course into pursuing business goals rather than corporate social responsibility. TPI's inability to survive was because it was lacking of strategy to bring schools' interest in applying it in classrooms. TPI provided the product but forgot to teach the market how to use the product.

Now we see another trouble brewing in computer technology. When I was working at the first e-learning company in Indonesia, along with many APJII (Asosiasi Pengusaha Jasa Internet Indonesia - Association of Indonesian Internet Service Providers) members and many other promoters, we did an internet awareness campaign for education. It is called Sumpah Internet Pemuda 2000. We encouraged the schools to build internet lab on their premises with a lot of promises that it is going to be beneficial to schools' educational objectives. The cost keeps flowing in maintaining this facility; however, there is no value added to school’s objectives. The teacher, who has never been asked whether the school needs those technologies, gets the blame. It was the biggest sin that the industry made to the school. We brought them product but we never tell them how to use it in the classroom.

When teacher develops resistance to technology, this can lead to school’s failure in negotiating with technology. We can overcome this by breaking the cycle of failure like what Cuban said in five steps.

First, we must come to a common understanding about what is technology and what is educational technology. If clothing is a product of technology, would you consider school uniform as educational technology? If technology is state of the art gadgetries, consequently we must we exclude books in educational technology. Technology is both product and process. Lesson plan is educational technology because it is a process that supports education.

Secondly, we need to identify the right technology for school's situation. In educational technology discipline this is called media selection. In order to help students reproduce the knowledge, student can use the old fashioned writing assignment or website development. The objectives determine the chosen media. Both media deliver the same result of knowledge reproduction. Old fashion writing assignment helps students in organizing train of thoughts while website development help students doing hyperthinking or non-linear thinking.

Rome was not built in a day; the third step is to devise an action plan to improve school technology literacy. In order to train students to be able to do hyperthinking, students must be able to organize their train of thoughts first. These two can even be broken down into several tasks. The action plan requires not only, lesson plan but also financial support plan.

The school may decide that it is best to understand logic of computer early. One of the many procedures that teacher can use is integrating information searching and processing in the classroom. In teaching about cleanliness to a pre-schooler, teacher may include activity of looking for that information and verifying it. This activity will vary in each education level. Challenge the teachers and the students to find more efficient way to search and process the information. Better technology means more efficient technology, isn’t it? Therefore, in the fourth action, school needs to devise a guided procedure for implementing technology on day to day basis at school for each level of education.

Lastly, but not the least, school must involve teachers from the very beginning of the decision making. Prior to teacher’s involvement, teacher must be empowered by building teacher’s awareness of their technology choice and its impact to the classroom. By making the teachers interested and involved in the school’s course of action, teachers’ participation can be higher. Therefore it will decrease resistance from teachers.

Postman was right. This negotiation process takes a lot to bet on. The school's failure to negotiate with technology will cause what Postman said "The surrender of culture to technology" when school is dictated by technology or what Cuban said about teacher's resistance. You choose, both are not favorable for us.

Jaha Nababan is Fulbright Grantee, Kelly-Cabot Scholar and graduated from Boston University School of Education.