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Indonesia: Mobile Labs Bring Science Closer to Rural Kids

Posted on: Tuesday, 6 July 2004, 06:00 CDT

JAKARTA, Jul. 6, 2004 (IPS/GIN) -- Across Indonesia, many schools are not equipped with science laboratories. But the government's introduction of a mobile laboratory could be the solution.

"With this mobile science laboratory, students can conduct experiments and research even in the remotest areas," Indra Djati Sidi, director general of elementary and intermediate education, told IPS.

Indonesia's first mobile science laboratory, launched on Jun. 24 by the Ministry of National Education, is currently visiting schools in Jakarta that do not have science laboratories.

This month, the mobile laboratory will be used by ill-equipped schools in Bandung, West Java and is scheduled to be in Pekanbaru, Riau in August.

The mobile laboratory has already visited a number of schools in Subang and Indramayu in West Java. Hanging on the exterior part of the mobile laboratory is a banner that reads, "Science is Everywhere."

Accompanying the mobile science laboratory are several instructors and technicians who do laboratory work, demonstrations and provide trainings in practical activities to other teachers. Teaching modules on biology, chemistry and physics are also given out to teachers during school visits of the mobile laboratory.

"We hope that with this road show, all municipalities will be encouraged to get hold of a mobile laboratory so that students can at least have the feeling of doing laboratory work," Sidi said.

During the launching of the mobile laboratory, students from various schools in the capital tested the different laboratory equipment such as microscopes, magnifying lenses, thermometers and stop watches.

"These students hardly have access to laboratory facilities," said Simon Bone, project director of Indonesian Science Festival.

Around one-third of the 8,558 state high schools across the country, especially in remote rural areas in the eastern part of Indonesia like Papua, Maluku, Sulawesi and East Nusa Tenggara, do not have science laboratories, according to the Ministry of National Education.

The figure does not include tens of thousands of private high schools and other institutes with poor laboratory facilities.

"I teach biology, chemistry and physics but our school doesn't have a science laboratory or any laboratory equipment. So my teaching is mostly theoretical," Senobius Santi, a teacher at a Catholic high school in South Jakarta, told IPS.

"Now that we have a mobile science laboratory, it would be easy for my students to conduct experiments," Santi said.

A school that wants to use the mobile laboratory needs to get in touch with the Ministry of National Education.

"With the mobile laboratory, there would be more practical science for students," said Handikin, head of education of the Indonesian Science Festival.

Designed in a 2002 interdisciplinary project involving faculty and students of the renowned Bandung Institute of Technology, the prototype of the mobile science laboratory was completed last year at a production cost of 600 million rupiahs ($65,000 U.S.) and can accommodate 40 students.

"This is just a prototype and it can be improved," Sidi said, referring to the brand new mobile laboratory that takes the form of a van.

Indonesian students are quite competitive in science as many of them won awards in international competitions in biology, chemistry and physics. In last year's International Physics Olympiad in Taipei, Indonesia garnered five medals, including a gold medal.

"Indonesian students are very much interested in science. But the lack of laboratories hampers their learning," Handikin said.

According to the Ministry of National Education, the introduction of the mobile science laboratory aims to inculcate among students that "science is fun" and fits the new competence- based curriculum, which will be implemented starting July this year.

"The mobile laboratory would enhance the skills of our students in the fields of biology, chemistry and physics,' Education Minister Malik Fadjar told IPS.

In line with the government's decentralisation policy, the Ministry of National Education changed the current heavily based content curriculum to one that is competence-based.

"The need for curriculum reform in Indonesia is significant due to global changes. Nowadays, more and more new industries are based on knowledge and high level of skills," said Ella Yulaelawati, one of the pioneers of curriculum development in Indonesia.

"The new curriculum, which is decentralisation-oriented, is designed to improve quality of schooling," Yulaelawati said in an interview.

To increase the level of science education in Indonesia, the Ministry of National Education is aiming that all the country's 400 municipalities would have one mobile laboratory each. However, funding is the major problem.

"The central government would like to procure several mobile laboratories and give them to the poor districts but we don't have the financial support yet to do so," Sidi said.

But Stanislaus Jodhi, a school headmaster in Flores, East Nusa Tenggara province, is not so sure about the central government's commitment to science education.

"I doubt if the government would prioritise the acquisition of mobile laboratories as there are other more important matters that it needs to address," he told IPS.

Jodhi stressed that dilapidated school buildings as well as scarcity and low salaries of teachers are problems that require urgent solutions from the central government.

Newspapers in Indonesia frequently report on the number of schools that have deteriorated and collapsed, forcing students to study in makeshift classrooms under extremely uncomfortable and inappropriate conditions.

With its weak economy and limited national revenues, the Indonesian government is finding great difficulty to allocate 20 percent of the state budget to education as stipulated in the constitution.

This year, the government allotted not more than eight percent of the budget to education and pointed out that the budgetary requirement can only be met in 2009 at the earliest.

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