Beyond access: Making Indonesia’s

education system work

Indonesia’s education system is low in quality and the underlying causes are political.

Key Findings
 Indonesia’s education system has been a high-volume, low-quality enterprise that has
fallen well short of the country’s ambitions for an “internationally competitive” system.
 This outcome has reflected inadequate funding, human resource deficits, perverse
incentive structures, and poor management but has most fundamentally been a matter of
politics and power.
 The political causes of poor education performance include the continued dominance of
political, bureaucratic, and corporate elites over the education system under the New
Order and the role that progressive NGOs and parent, teacher, and student groups have
had in education policymaking since the fall of the New Order, making reform difficult.

Executive Summary
Indonesia’s biggest challenge regarding education is no longer improving access but improving
quality. The Indonesian Government hopes to develop a ‘world-class’ education system by 2025.
However, numerous assessments of the country’s education performance suggest that it has a
long way to go before it will achieve that goal. Many Indonesian teachers and lecturers lack the
required subject knowledge and pedagogical skills to be effective educators; learning outcomes
for students are poor; and there is a disparity between the skills of graduates and the needs of
employers.

This Analysis explores the reasons behind these problems and the implications for Australian
education providers. It argues that Indonesia’s poor education performance has not simply been a
matter of low public spending on education, human resource deficits, perverse incentive
structures, and poor management. It has, at its root, been a matter of politics and power. Change
in the quality of Indonesia’s education system thus depends on a shift in the balance of power
between competing coalitions that have a stake in the nature of education policy and its
implementation. This barrier to improved educational performance is likely to limit the scope for
Australian education providers to develop closer research linkages with Indonesian universities,
offer Australian students more in-country study options in Indonesia, recruit greater numbers of
Indonesian students, and establish branch campuses in Indonesia.

Introduction
Over the past few decades, Indonesia has made great strides in improving access to education.
Indonesian children are starting school earlier and staying in school longer than they ever have
before. But the country has made relatively little progress in improving educational quality and
learning outcomes. Assessments of the country’s education system suggest that it is beset by
poor quality tuition, poor learning outcomes, inadequate facilities, and disciplinary problems.[1]
The country’s results in international standardised assessments of student achievement have been
poor relative to other countries including in Southeast Asia. In December 2014, the then Minister
of Education and Culture, Anies Baswedan, declared publicly that the country’s educational
performance was so poor and violence within the school system so widespread that the country
faced an education “emergency”.[2]

In terms of formal policy and planning, improving the quality of Indonesia’s education system
has been a key priority for the Indonesian Government. For more than a decade, Ministry of
Education and Culture[3] strategic plans have stated that the country needs to produce “smart
and competitive” individuals who can compete successfully for jobs and other opportunities in
an increasingly globalised economy if the country is to become economically competitive.[4]
Various Indonesian presidents — in particular, President Joko Widodo and his predecessor
Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono — have expressed similar ideas in public statements.[5] A number
of recent government education plans have envisaged Indonesia’s education system becoming
“internationally competitive” by 2025 and, in particular, having increasing numbers of
Indonesian universities in the world’s top 500 universities.[6]

Conventional analyses — particularly those produced by international development

organisations such as the World Bank, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and
Development (OECD), and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) — have attributed the poor
quality of Indonesia’s education system and its difficulties in improving learning outcomes to its
proximate causes: inadequate funding, human resource deficits, perverse incentive structures,
and poor management. They have recommended that the Indonesian Government increase
education funding, improve teacher training, and reform education administration.

However, the country’s problems with education quality and learning have also been, at their
root, a matter of politics and power. Indonesia has not just lacked the financial, human resource,
and administrative prerequisites for a high-quality education system but, crucially, the
underlying political prerequisites. Making Indonesia’s education system ‘work’ — in the sense
of achieving higher educational standards and better learning outcomes — therefore requires a
fundamental shift in the underlying political and social relationships that have shaped the
evolution of Indonesia’s education system to date. Only when a shift in these relationships
occurs will measures to improve financing, address human resource deficits, improve
educational administration and the like yield results.

This Analysis provides a brief overview of Indonesia’s education system and its achievements in
relation to access to education, educational quality, and student learning. It examines the
proximate causes of Indonesia’s lack of success in promoting educational quality and better
learning outcomes as emphasised in conventional analyses of the country’s education system
before then offering an alternative, more politically focused explanation. It also considers the
implications of the analysis for Australian education providers and future efforts to improve
education quality and learning outcomes in Indonesia.

Overview of Indonesia’s education system

Indonesia’s education system comprises four levels of education: primary (grades 1–6), junior
secondary (grades 7–9), senior secondary (grades 10–12), and higher education. The first two
levels constitute ‘basic education’ as that term is used in the Indonesian context. State
educational institutions dominate the education system, particularly at primary and junior
secondary levels. However, the private sector also plays a significant role, accounting for around
48 per cent of all schools, 31 per cent of all students, and 38 per cent of all teachers.[7] It also
accounts for 96 per cent of all higher education institutions (HEIs) and almost 63 per cent of
higher education enrolments.[8] The state educational system is mostly non-sectarian although it
includes some religious (typically but not only Islamic) schools and HEIs. The private
educational system, by contrast, is dominated by religiously oriented schools and HEIs, in
particular those associated with Indonesia’s two major Islamic social organisations,
Muhammadiyah and Nahdlatul Ulama, although it also includes non-religious commercially
oriented institutions especially in higher education. Generally, state educational institutions are
considered to be of higher quality than private educational institutions although there is great
variation among both public and private institutions.

Responsibility for managing the education system has changed significantly over time. Under the
New Order, the regime that ruled Indonesia from 1965 to 1998, education was highly centralised.
The Ministry of Education and Culture had primary responsibility for managing all levels of the
education system with a number of other central government ministries and agencies also
playing significant roles. The most important of these was the Ministry of Religious Affairs,
which was responsible for funding state Islamic schools and HEIs and regulating matters related
to religious education. In 2001, the central government transferred authority over education
policy and management to district-level governments in line with decentralisation, although this
shift did not extend to higher education. The Directorate-General of Higher Education within the
Ministry of Education and Culture continued to coordinate, supervise, and direct all state and
private HEIs while the Ministry of Religious Affairs maintained close oversight of the network
of religious HEIs. In October 2014, then newly elected President Joko Widodo removed the
Directorate-General of Higher Education from the Ministry of Education and Culture and
merged it with the Ministry for Research and Technology, creating a new Ministry for Research,
Technology and Higher Education. The Ministry of Education and Culture was left with
responsibility for managing primary, junior secondary, and senior secondary education. The
Ministry of Religious Affairs retained responsibility for religious schools as well as matters
related to religious education.

Educational performance
Indonesia has made enormous progress in improving access to education in recent decades. The
New Order invested heavily in building new public schools, especially primary schools, and
recruiting teachers during the 1970s and early 1980s when it was awash with petrodollars due to
the boom in international oil prices. At the same time, it promoted the expansion of the higher
education system by facilitating the establishment and growth of private HEIs. Post-New Order
governments have continued to construct new schools (albeit at a much slower rate than during
the 1970s and early 1980s), focusing on junior secondary and senior secondary schools, and
recruit large numbers of teachers. By 2011, the country had over 200 000 schools and three
million teachers (Figures 1–3). They have also continued to facilitate the expansion of private
HEIs (Table 1).

Figure 1: School numbers, 1972–1998

Senior SecondaryJunior SecondaryPrimary

19721974197619781980198219841986198819901992199419961998025k50k75k100k
125k150k175k

Note: Data excludes Islamic schools under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Religious Affairs
Source: Indonesian Central Bureau of Statistics, https://www.bps.go.id/linkTabelStatis/view/id/1530, accessed 1 July 2017

Figure 2: School numbers, 1999–2011

Senior SecondaryJunior SecondaryPrimary

1999200020012002200320042005200620072008200920102011025k50k75k100k125k
150k175k

Note: Data excludes Islamic schools under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Religious Affairs
Source: Indonesian Central Bureau of Statistics, https://www.bps.go.id/linkTabelStatis/view/id/1530, accessed 1 July 2017

Figure 3: Teacher numbers, primary and secondary education (millions)

Teachers in primary education

Teachers in secondary education1970197519801985199019952000200520100500k1
000k1 500k2 000k

Note: Includes full-time and part-time teachers of both sexes

Source: World Bank, World Development Indicators, https://data.worldbank.org/data-catalog/world-development-indicators

Table 1: Number of higher education institutions in Indonesia

Private
  State State Religious Private Total
Religious
1994/1995 77   1159   1236
1995/1996 77   1228   1305
1996/1997 77   1293   1370
1997/1998 77   1314   1391
1998/1999 77   1449   1526
1999/2000 76   1557   1633
2000/2001 76   1671   1747
2001/2002 45   1846   1891
2002/2003 78   1846   1924
2003/2004 81   2347   2428
2004/2005 81   2391   2472
2005/2006 82   2756   2838
2006/2007 82   2556   2638
2007/2008 82 52 2598 494 3226
2008/2009 83 52 2892 506 3533
2009/2010 83 52 2928 522 3585
2010/2011 88 52 3097 557 3794
2011/2012 92 52 3078 593 3815

Note: Institutes, Colleges, Academies, and Polytechnics have been included from 2002/2003 onwards
Source: Indonesian Central Bureau of Statistics

These efforts to expand the supply of education have intersected with rising income levels,
demographic changes, and government efforts to provide free education, all of which have
served to increase the demand for education. The result has been a marked increase in student
enrolment rates at all levels of the education system. For example, between 1972 and 2015, the
country’s gross enrolment rate (the ratio of total enrolment, regardless of age, to the population
of the age group that officially corresponds to the level of education shown[9]) increased from
85 per cent to 105 per cent for primary schools, from 18 per cent to 85 per cent for secondary
schools, and from 2 per cent to 24 per cent for HEIs (see Figure 4). Importantly, this growth in
enrolment is closely associated with increased female participation in education, improving
gender equity in the sector. As Figure 5 shows, the country’s gender parity index (GPI) scores
for primary, secondary, and tertiary education all improved significantly between 1972 and 2015.
The GPI measures the ratio of girls to boys enrolled at the relevant level of schooling in public
and private schools.

Figure 4: Gross enrolment rates, %, 1970–2015

PrimarySecondary
Tertiary19701975198019851990199520002005201020150255075100125150

Note: Gross enrolment rates can be greater than 100 if students enrol early or late or repeat a grade
Source: World Bank, World Development Indicators, https://data.worldbank.org/data-catalog/world-development-indicators

Figure 5: Gender parity index – Education, 1970–2015

PrimarySecondary
Tertiary19701975198019851990199520002005201020150.20.40.60.811.2

Source: World Bank, World Development Indicators, https://data.worldbank.org/data-catalog/world-development-indicators

However, this dramatic improvement in access to education has not been matched by
improvements in educational quality and learning outcomes. The few studies of student
achievement in primary and secondary school conducted during the New Order suggested that
achievement levels were low, improved little if at all over time, and compared poorly to other
countries.[10] Indonesia’s performance in international standardised tests of student achievement
from 1999–2015 suggest little has changed in these respects since the fall of the New Order. In
the most recent iteration of PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment) in 2015, 42
per cent of Indonesian 15 year olds failed to meet minimum standards in all three areas covered
by the test: reading, mathematics, and science.[11] At the same time, as Figure 6 shows,
Indonesia’s scores on PISA, TIMSS (Trends in International Mathematics and Science), and
PIRLS (Progress in International Reading Literacy Study) have improved little over time. This
trend has served to cement Indonesia’s place towards the bottom of the list of assessed countries
in these tests and behind neighbouring countries such as Malaysia, Vietnam, and Thailand.[12]

Figure 6: Indonesia’s performance in international standardised tests

Mean performance on subject scale

mean_performance_on_subject_scale.png
Source: World Bank, Education Statistics, http://datatopics.worldbank.org/education/wDashboard/dqlearningcnty

Higher education outcomes have been no better. Recent assessments of the country’s higher
education system suggest that it continues to produce graduates who lack the skills employers
need, in particular, those required for professional and managerial roles.[13] Nor does it “provide
the necessary research needed to support innovation”.[14] The quality of research and teaching
in Indonesia’s higher education system — even at the country’s best institutions — is generally
regarded as poor relative to both global standards and those of neighbouring countries in Asia.
[15] According to the World Bank, Indonesian researchers published 16 139 scientific papers
between 1996 and 2011, an average of 1000 papers per year, placing the country in 63rd position
globally and 11th place within the region.[16] At the same time, as a study of the education
system in Indonesia noted, “few researchers based at Indonesian HEIs produce research papers
without international cooperation, which suggests limited research capacity”.[17] It is more
difficult to judge the quality of teaching at Indonesian HEIs but Ministry of Education and
Culture accreditation results provide some insight. In 2012, only 23 per cent of state university
undergraduate degree (S1) programs and 4.5 per cent of private university undergraduate degree
programs received the maximum grade of A.[18]

With poor-quality research and teaching, few Indonesian universities have ranked in the top 500
in global league tables (see Table 2).

Table 2: Indonesian universities in the top 500 world rankings

2015 2016 2017 2018

University
University of Indonesia (277)
University of Indonesia University of Indonesia
(310)
(358) (325)
QS World University Institute
Rankings Institute of Bandung
Institute of Technology, Institute of Technology,
Technology, Bandung
Bandung (431–440) Bandung (401–410)
(461–470) Gadjah M
(401–410
Times Higher Education
World University 0 0 0 na
Rankings
Academic Ranking of
0 0 na na
World Universities

Sources: QS, Times Higher Education and ARWU websites

In sum, Indonesia has had great success in getting children into school and keeping them there, at
least until the end of the compulsory basic education period (the end of junior secondary school).
However, it has had much less success in ensuring that these children receive an education. The
country’s education system has been a high-volume, low-quality enterprise that has fallen well
short of the “internationally competitive” system Ministry of Education and Culture plans
anticipate will emerge in the near future.

Proximate causes of poor educational quality and learning

outcomes in Indonesia
In explaining the poor quality of education and learning outcomes in Indonesia, most analysis —
in particular, that of international development organisations such as the World Bank, the OECD,
and the ADB — points to the effects of four main factors.
The first is the level of government spending on education. Although the New Order government
invested heavily in expanding the school system during the oil boom, it cut education spending
significantly following the collapse of international oil prices in the mid-1980s.[19] By 1995 it
was spending barely 1 per cent of GDP on education, far less than other lower middle-income
countries and comparable neighbouring countries (Table 3). Government spending on education
has grown markedly since the fall of the New Order and, in particular, since 2002 when the
national constitution was amended to require the central and regional governments to spend at
least 20 per cent of their respective budgets on education. However, while education spending is
now at a level similar to other lower middle-income countries, it is still less than comparable
neighbouring countries.

Table 3: Government spending on education, selected years, % of GDP

1995 2004 2013

East Asia and the Pacific
2.43 2.74 4.12
(IDA and IBRD countries)
All lower middle-income countries 4.09(i) 3.29 3.40(ii)
Malaysia 4.35 5.92 5.47
Thailand 3.14 4.03 4.12
Philippines 3.03 2.56 2.65(iii)
Vietnam na 4.87(iv) 5.65
Indonesia 1.00 2.74 3.35

Notes: (i) 1999 figure; (ii) 2012 figure; (iii) 2009 figure; (iv) 2008 figure
Source: World Bank, World Development Indicators, https://data.worldbank.org/data-catalog/world-development-indicators

This low level of government investment has undermined education quality in a variety of ways.
For example, it has encouraged the growth of low-quality private educational institutions to
absorb demand for education not met by public schools and HEIs; limited the state’s ability to
pay teachers competitive salaries and, therefore, reduced incentives for high-quality school/HEI
graduates to pursue teaching careers; made it difficult for the state to ensure that adequate
teaching supplies, textbooks, and facilities are available at the institutional level; and limited the
ability of Indonesian HEIs to support research.[20]

The second factor is the quality of Indonesian teachers and lecturers. Prior to 2005, most
Indonesian teachers had low-level qualifications with less than 40 per cent holding a four-year
bachelor’s degree.[21] At the same time, many teachers lacked the basic subject knowledge and
pedagogical skills to be effective educators. In 2012, the central government introduced a
competency test for teachers to assess their subject knowledge and pedagogical skills. The
almost three million teachers who took the test in 2015 scored on average 53.02, below the
designated target of 55.[22] The enactment of Law 14/2005 on Teachers and Lecturers led to the
introduction of a teacher certification program that linked generous pay rises to improvements in
qualifications and skills. However, numerous studies have shown that this program has had little,
if any, positive impact on teacher subject knowledge or pedagogical skills or, indeed, student
learning.[23]
The situation has been much the same in higher education. According to the World Bank, more
than one-third of Indonesia’s academic labour force has a bachelor’s degree or less.[24] Only
about 10 per cent have PhDs. This imbalance is more pronounced in private than public HEIs but
is a feature even of the country’s top universities.[25] Domestic production of masters and PhD
graduates has “grown steadily” in recent years but has been “too small to provide the amounts of
human capital needed for an increased critical mass of qualified instructors and professors”.[26]

The third factor is reward/incentive systems that discourage Indonesian teachers and lecturers
from delivering high-quality teaching and, in the case of university academics, high-quality
research. Teacher and academic appointments have tended to be made on the basis of loyalty,
friendship, and familial connections rather than merit; promotions have tended to occur
automatically after staff have met particular administrative requirements rather than on the basis
of a track record in delivering high-quality research and teaching; and terminations have been
rare even when staff performance is poor.[27] At the same time, low salaries at both public and
private educational institutions have encouraged teachers and academics to take on extra work,
sometimes of a non-academic nature.[28] The result has been widespread absenteeism in both
the school and higher education systems. Recent analysis suggests there has been a significant
reduction in absenteeism rates among school teachers over the decade from 2003 to 2013, but
that on any given day 10 per cent of teachers are still absent when they are scheduled to be at
work.[29]

The fourth factor is poor government management of public educational institutions, in particular
excessive government control over their activities. Under the New Order, public educational
institutions were formally units within the bureaucracy rather than separate legal entities and
their staff were classified as civil servants. They had virtually no managerial or financial
autonomy. Decentralisation transferred authority over public schools to district governments but
did not change their formal legal status as part of the bureaucracy. In recent years, the central
government has endeavoured to give public schools and HEIs greater financial and managerial
autonomy including by changing their legal status and, in the case of schools alone, designating
some as ‘international standard’. However, for reasons that are outlined below, these endeavours
have largely failed. A lack of autonomy has meant that public schools and HEIs have been
subject to “too many restrictions and binding rules … to develop at a reasonable pace and in
keeping with changing local needs and circumstances”.[30]

The political economy of educational quality and learning

outcomes in Indonesia
The poor performance of Indonesian educational institutions cannot just be explained by the
proximate causes outlined above. It also reflects the way that a range of elite actors, including
bureaucrats, political leaders, and business people, have often stymied efforts to improve the
quality of the education system.[31] Former President Suharto’s New Order was dominated by
an alliance of bureaucratic officials and their corporate clients.[32] Unconstrained by the rule of
law, these officials were able to sell access to state facilities, licenses, concessions, credit, and
positions to enrich themselves and generate resources for patronage purposes. They also
spawned the emergence of major domestic business conglomerates, many owned by family or
friends of senior bureaucratic figures,[33] the competitiveness of which rested on their political
connections. This alliance of forces maintained its political and social dominance under the New
Order by securing control over parliament, the bureaucracy, and the courts; restricting
opportunities for independent organisations; promoting economic development; lubricating
patronage networks; and harshly repressing dissent.

The onset of the Asian Financial Crisis in 1997 weakened the economic base of this alliance by
precipitating widespread corporate bankruptcy, increasing the country’s public debt,
undermining sources of government revenue, and forcing the government to negotiate a rescue
package with the International Monetary Fund. The implosion of the New Order system saw its
principal patron, President Suharto, resign from office. However, these developments did not
eliminate the role these forces played in politics and business. As Professor Vedi Hadiz has
argued, bureaucrats and their corporate allies have been “able to reinvent themselves through
new alliances and vehicles” such as political parties.[34] While democratisation has led to
increasing separation between political and bureaucratic authority (most obviously manifest in
empowered national and regional parliaments) and opened up spaces for new actors to influence
policymaking, the bureaucratic and corporate forces that dominated the New Order have largely
maintained instrumental control over the state apparatus.

These elements have had little interest in the development of a high-quality education system
producing strong learning outcomes. Their interests have been the development of an education
system that helps them to accumulate resources, distribute patronage, mobilise political support,
and exercise political control rather than one that produces “smart and competitive” Indonesians
capable of competing for jobs and other economic opportunities in the global economy. Their
focus has accordingly been on expanding the scope or reach of the education system rather than
improving its quality. They have also had an interest in limiting the public funding consumed by
the education system to ensure that government resources are concentrated in areas of public
spending (such as infrastructure) that offer them better opportunities to accumulate rents.

One illustration of this has been a general lack of interest by major business groups and their
representative organisations, the Indonesian Chamber of Commerce (KADIN) and the
Indonesian Employers’ Association (APINDO), in matters related to education and especially
education quality. Indonesian businesses have long complained of difficulty in recruiting skilled
local workers to fill professional and management positions. However, their lobbying efforts
have tended to focus on promoting more flexible labour regulations and securing various forms
of government largesse rather than on education quality.[35]

In 2012, McKinsey Global Institute issued a report on the Indonesian economy that shifted the
focus by calling for a range of measures to improve the quality of Indonesia’s education system
including, among other things, raising “the standard of teaching with an emphasis on attracting
and developing great teachers”.[36] It proposed that the government should increase teacher
remuneration, recruit teachers from the top tier of graduates, and improve teacher distribution.
Given McKinsey’s prominent position within the business sector, this report may indicate that
there has been a change in the business community’s approach to education issues. But such
pronouncements have been the exception rather than the rule.
Indonesia’s education system has instead become part of the larger ‘franchise’ structure that was
established under the New Order regime and which has endured into the post-New Order period,
the key feature of which is the purchase of government positions in exchange for access to the
rents they could generate.[37] Prior to the New Order, local community members such as parents
played a central role in the management of Indonesian public schools. Early in the New Order
period they were pushed aside in favour of bureaucrats who bought their positions at schools in
exchange for the opportunity to make money through corruption and fees or were given them as
a payoff for support to higher political or bureaucratic officials.[38] Similar dynamics have been
at work in public HEIs. Ambitious teachers or academics have accordingly focused on securing
senior administrative positions that provide opportunities to supplement their income through
corruption or consulting and outside teaching work, rather than upgrading their qualifications,
improving the quality of their teaching, or producing traditional research outputs.[39]

At the same time, schools and HEIs have become vehicles through which political elites have
mobilised votes at election time and exercised control.[40] Under the New Order, teachers and
lecturers who had civil servant status were required to support the ruling Golkar Party, and both
take and teach compulsory courses in the state ideology, Pancasila. Teachers were also required
to be members of the Indonesian Teachers Union (PGRI), the sole recognised teachers’ trade
union.

The collapse of the New Order saw the removal of some of these requirements. However, the
PGRI has remained the dominant institution for teacher representation and has remained closely
connected to government, especially at the regional level. At the same time, Indonesia’s
transition to democracy resulted in fervent competition for teachers’ votes, given their large
number and a widespread assumption that one teacher’s vote is worth several because of their
family and social networks.[41] So intense is this competition that it is not uncommon for
teachers who back losing candidates in elections for regional head to be ‘punished’ by being
moved to isolated parts of a region.[42] As Kompas has reported:

"In a number of regions, teachers and school principals have begun being involved as
members of candidates’ success teams in regional head elections. If the supported candidate
wins, the school principals’ terms will be extended. On the other hand, school principals who
support losing candidates are directly transferred to remote areas or demoted for no apparent
reason."[43]

Another reason for the poor performance of Indonesian schools and HEIs has been the role
played by public actors including progressive NGOs,[44] student organisations, independent
teacher unions,[45] parents’ groups, and nationalist intellectuals concerned about education.[46]
These groups have promoted an education agenda that combines rights-based approaches to
development, a concern to protect the state school sector from market-oriented reform, and
nationalist perspectives. Their key policy concerns have been to promote citizens’ rights of
access to education, ensure equality, and build national identity and resilience through the
education system — although the relative emphasis placed on these elements varies. The
transition to democratic rule increased the scope for these forces to influence government policy
by removing key obstacles to political organisation, opening up new entry points into the
policymaking process, and creating an incentive for politicians and political parties to promote
redistributive policies for electoral reasons.[47]

To the extent that the Indonesian Government has sought to enhance education quality in the
post-New Order period it has done so primarily through the adoption of reforms aimed at
enhancing corporatisation, accountability, and competition in the education sector. During the
New Order, government technocrats and their allies in the donor community exercised little
influence on education policy. However, the Asian Financial Crisis increased their leverage by
increasing the Indonesian Government’s need for foreign aid and private investment. This
allowed technocrats to introduce a range of education reforms that emphasised more autonomy
for educational institutions, academic freedom, and openness to investment by foreign
educational institutions. These reforms were, however, fiercely resisted by both those parts of the
bureaucracy and corporate sector that were profiting from the old system as well as the public
actors mentioned above, newly empowered by Indonesia’s transition to democracy. This clash
between reformers and those forces resistant to change left the country without a viable strategy
for improving the quality of the education system.

One example of the impact of this deadlock was the Education Legal Entities (Badan Hukum
Pendidikan) Law in 2009. This law, which was the product of a World Bank-funded project
called Managing Higher Education for Relevance and Efficiency, changed the legal status of all
schools and HEIs in Indonesia to autonomous bodies called ‘educational legal entities’. The
underlying philosophy of the law was that educational institutions needed not just academic
freedom but also managerial and financial autonomy in order to improve educational standards
and quality. Well-connected elements — specifically the owners of private HEIs — mobilised in
opposition to the law because of fear that the change in legal status would mean they had less
control over their HEIs and the revenues they generated. Public groups — especially university
student organisations, human rights and anti-corruption NGOs, independent teacher associations,
and parents’ groups — also mobilised against the law. In their case, the concern was that greater
autonomy for public HEIs and public schools would entail higher fees at these institutions and
reduced access for the poor. They argued that the law promoted the ‘commercialisation’ or
‘privatisation’ of education.[48] In 2010, these groups, working in alliance with an organisation
representing corporate owners of private HEIs, successfully challenged the law in the
Constitutional Court resulting in its annulment.[49]

The government responded to this decision by enacting a new higher education law two years
later that offered a broader array of options in terms of the legal status of HEIs. Since the
enactment of this new law, eleven public HEIs have been granted a change in legal status to
‘legal entity’, roughly akin to the education legal entities created by the 2009 law. However,
efforts to promote better education quality and learning outcomes through changes to the legal
status of these institutions were otherwise effectively stymied.

A second case that illustrates the political obstacles to technocratic and donor efforts to promote
better education quality and learning outcomes was the government’s policy on ‘international
standard schools’ (Sekolah Bertaraf Internasional) introduced in 2009. Under this policy, schools
designated as ‘international standard’ were required to, among other things: follow curricula
used in OECD or other developed countries; use information and communication technology
(ICT) and English in the delivery of these curricula; and only enrol students who have met
minimum academic requirements.[50] In exchange for fulfilling these requirements, schools
were granted generous routine and additional funding and given permission to charge fees in
contrast to regular schools that had to adhere to the government’s policy of free basic education.
The objective of the policy was to create a small set of high-quality schools delivering a world-
class education to the country’s best and brightest. In practice, however, it created a two ‘caste’
educational system in which only those with the ability to pay gained access to an international
standard education, threatening equity.[51]

The policy on international standard schools attracted opposition from a range of public groups
including anti-corruption activists, education activists, trade unionists, and parents. In 2012,
lawyers at Indonesia Corruption Watch, a Jakarta-based NGO active in relation to the issue, with
support from other NGOs and parents’ groups launched a case challenging the constitutionality
of the establishment of the schools. In January 2013, the Constitutional Court ruled in their
favour, ending the international standard schools policy.

Perhaps most importantly, political resistance to reform also derailed efforts to implement a new
teacher certification program in a way that served to enhance teacher quality. This program was
established following recommendations by a World Bank–Bappenas Task Force in the late 1990s
that the government link future pay raises for teachers to improvements in teacher skills and
knowledge and PGRI demands to introduce new legislation in order to improve teacher welfare.
[52] As noted earlier, the program entailed generous pay rises for teachers who could
demonstrate competency with regards to subject knowledge and pedagogical skills but has thus
far had little, if any, positive impact in this respect or in terms of student learning.

One of the reasons for its limited impact is that the competency component of the program was
effectively removed in the face of fierce opposition from the PGRI and independent teacher
unions which saw this component as a threat to increased pay for many of their members —
something they saw as a ‘right’. Led by the PGRI, they lobbied the national parliament — which
had control over the budget for implementation of the competency tests — to have this element
of the model thrown out, presumably threatening to mobilise the teacher vote against politicians
who stood in their way. A compromise system that involved preparation of teacher portfolios and
a 90-hour training program proved to be problematic in practice as corrupt behaviour on the part
of teachers, education agency officials, and staff at teacher education institutions undermined
both forms of assessment.[53]

Implications for Australian education providers

These political dynamics and their effects have important implications for Australian education
providers, especially universities and vocational education and training (VET) providers, both of
which are heavily engaged in international education. In recent decades, Australian universities
and VET providers have sought to improve the quality of their offerings, enhance
competitiveness, and maintain financial viability. They have done this by, among other things,
attracting international students, creating new overseas study opportunities for Australian
students, forging international research linkages, and establishing overseas campuses. However,
political obstacles to improved education quality and reform in Indonesia impose constraints on
the extent to which they can pursue these endeavours through engagement with Indonesia.

International students: Australian universities and VET providers have been extremely
successful in attracting full fee-paying international students in recent years including from
Indonesia. In 2017, Indonesia ranked ninth as a source of international students in Australia,
accounting for 2.5 per cent of total international student enrolments.[54] However, given
Indonesia’s proximity and population size, enrolments have been lower than might be expected.
This has in part reflected the fact that Indonesians have a lower capacity to pay for international
education than people in wealthier countries. But it is also due to the lower quality of Indonesian
graduates: with weak academic skills, prospective Indonesian students have often found it
difficult to meet entry requirements at Australian universities and VET providers, especially
English language proficiency requirements. If Indonesia is unable to resolve the political
challenges surrounding education quality, Australian universities and VET providers will likely
continue to look elsewhere in recruiting international students, although there may be greater
scope for VET providers to recruit Indonesian students given their generally lower entry
requirements.

Overseas study opportunities for Australian students: Although Australian students at Australian
universities and VET providers are increasingly spending time overseas as part of their studies,
only a small number choose to study at Indonesian educational institutions. The reasons for this
are complex but relate in part to negative perceptions among Australian students about the
quality of Indonesian educational institutions. Continued inability on Indonesia’s part to resolve
the political challenges surrounding educational quality is therefore likely to limit the extent to
which Australian universities and VET providers can grow Indonesian study options. The
Australian Consortium for In-country Indonesian Studies, a major provider of Indonesia-based
study programs for Australian university students, has experienced solid demand for its in-
country language and short course practicum-based programs in professional and applied fields
in recent years, in the latter case because these tap into growing student demand for work-
integrated learning opportunities. It is possible that such programs will continue to grow in
future. However, it is harder to see Australian universities and VET providers investing
significant resources in the development or expansion of regular, classroom-based study options
outside language training in the absence of significant improvements in education quality.

Research linkages: In recent years, Australian universities have dramatically expanded

collaborative research endeavours with foreign HEIs, particularly in the Asia-Pacific.[55]
However, there has been little collaboration with Indonesian HEIs because of the limited scope
for it to produce high-quality research outcomes. As long as Indonesian HEIs lack the capacity to
produce world-class research, Australian universities will have little incentive to engage in joint
research activities except through Australian Government initiatives specifically aimed at
funding such activities such as the Australia–Indonesia Centre.

Overseas campuses: Indonesia’s higher education law allows foreign universities to operate in
Indonesia on the condition that they collaborate with Indonesian partners and meet various other
conditions. However, no Australian university has so far established a campus in Indonesia. This
is because the Indonesian Government has baulked at passing regulations implementing the
relevant provisions of the higher education law in the face of strong political opposition from
HEIs and public actors — opposition that has been part of the wider resistance to market-
oriented education reform discussed above. In November 2017, President Joko Widodo stated
that he wished to see foreign universities operating in Indonesia. One month later Vice-President
Jusuf Kalla said that the government intended to allow them to do so.[56] Muhammad Nasir,
Indonesia’s Research, Technology and Higher Education Minister, confirmed the apparent
change in direction in late January 2018, noting that a set of leading foreign universities had
already expressed interest in establishing campuses.[57] But it remains to be seen whether they
ultimately act on these intentions, how long it might take them to do so, and whether any
resulting regulatory changes impose unworkable restrictions on foreign universities. Nasir has
already indicated that it will not be open slather for foreign universities; they will be required to
partner with domestic private universities and the Indonesian Government will determine what
they teach and where they build their campuses.

Conclusion
This Analysis examined the reasons why Indonesia has so far failed to develop a high-quality
education system capable of producing strong learning outcomes. It argued that this outcome has
not simply been a matter of inadequate funding, human resource deficits, perverse incentive
structures, and poor management. It has fundamentally been a matter of politics and power.
Specifically, it reflects the dominance of political, bureaucratic, and corporate elites during the
New Order and their continued control over the state apparatus in the post-New Order period,
including the education bureaucracy and public educational institutions. It also reflects the fact
that public groups such as progressive NGOs and parent, teacher, and student groups have had
greater opportunity to participate in education policymaking since the fall of the New Order,
making reform more difficult.

The implication of this argument is that improved educational quality and learning outcomes in
Indonesia require more than just better resourcing for schools and HEIs, and better teacher
training programs. It requires more than policies providing for institutional autonomy and
decentralisation of managerial responsibility — the sorts of interventions that have been the
focus of technocratic and donor-sponsored education policy reforms over the past two decades. It
also requires a fundamental shift in the underlying political and social relationships that have
characterised Indonesia’s political economy and shaped the evolution of its education system. In
the absence of such a shift, interventions aimed at promoting educational quality are likely to be
stymied by political and social forces opposed to reform, for either ideological or material
reasons.

The outcome has implications for Australia as well as Indonesia and, in particular, for the
internationalisation of Australia’s education system. Given the importance of Australia’s broader
relationship with Indonesia, Australia has a strong interest in the development of strong
educational links between the two countries. Such links are unlikely to emerge, however, unless
Indonesia is able to resolve the political barriers to improved educational quality that it currently
faces.
Acknowledgements and disclaimer
I wish to thank Anthony Bubalo, Matthew Busch and Lydia Papandrea, and three anonymous
reviewers for very helpful comments on an earlier draft of this paper.

The Lowy Institute acknowledges the support of the Victorian Department of Premier and
Cabinet for this Analysis.

The views expressed in this Analysis are the author’s own and not those of the Lowy Institute,
University of Melbourne or the Victorian Department of Premier and Cabinet.

About the author

Andrew Rosser is Professor of Southeast Asian Studies at the University of Melbourne. After
completing undergraduate degrees in Commerce and Asian Studies at the University of Adelaide
and Flinders University, respectively, he enrolled in a PhD in Asian Studies/Politics and
International Studies at Murdoch University. Based in the Asia Research Centre, his research
there focused on analysing the politics of economic liberalisation in Indonesia during the New
Order and early post-New Order periods and the causes and consequences of the 1997–1998
Asian Financial Crisis. He subsequently worked at the University of Sydney, AusAID, the
Institute of Development Studies (Sussex), and the University of Adelaide, building an interest in
the political economy of development, policy-oriented research, and social policy. Between 2012
and 2015, he was an Australian Research Council Future Fellow, carrying out research on the
relationship between law, politics and social rights in Indonesia.
Making Indonesia’s education system work

Membuat sistem pendidikan Indonesia berfungsi

Abstrak
Tantangan terbesar Indonesia di bidang pendidikan adalah tidak lagi meningkatkan akses tetapi meningkatkan
kualitas. Pemerintah Indonesia berharap untuk mengembangkan sistem pendidikan 'kelas dunia' pada tahun 2025. Namun, banyak
penilaian terhadap kinerja pendidikan negara menunjukkan bahwa ia masih harus menempuh jalan panjang sebelum mencapai
tujuan itu. Banyak guru dan dosen Indonesia kekurangan pengetahuan mata pelajaran dan keterampilan pedagogis yang
diperlukan untuk menjadi pendidik yang efektif; hasil belajar untuk siswa buruk; dan ada perbedaan antara keterampilan lulusan
dan kebutuhan pengusaha.

Introduction
Selama beberapa dekade terakhir, Indonesia telah membuat langkah besar dalam meningkatkan akses ke pendidikan.
Anak-anak Indonesia mulai sekolah lebih awal dan tinggal di sekolah lebih lama dari yang pernah mereka miliki sebelumnya.
Tetapi negara ini telah membuat kemajuan yang relatif kecil dalam meningkatkan kualitas pendidikan dan hasil pembelajaran.
Penilaian sistem pendidikan negara menunjukkan bahwa itu diliputi oleh biaya kuliah yang buruk, hasil belajar yang buruk,
fasilitas yang tidak memadai, dan masalah disiplin. [1] Hasil negara ini dalam penilaian standar internasional atas prestasi siswa
telah buruk dibandingkan dengan negara lain termasuk di Asia Tenggara. Pada bulan Desember 2014, Menteri Pendidikan dan
Kebudayaan saat itu, Anies Baswedan, menyatakan secara terbuka bahwa kinerja pendidikan negara itu sangat buruk dan
kekerasan dalam sistem sekolah begitu luas sehingga negara tersebut menghadapi “darurat pendidikan”

Overview of Indonesia’s education system

Sistem pendidikan Indonesia terdiri dari empat tingkat pendidikan: sekolah dasar (kelas 1-6), sekolah menengah pertama
(kelas 7–9), sekolah menengah atas (kelas 10-12), dan pendidikan tinggi. Dua tingkat pertama merupakan 'pendidikan dasar'
karena istilah itu digunakan dalam konteks Indonesia. Institusi pendidikan negara mendominasi sistem pendidikan, khususnya di
tingkat sekolah dasar dan menengah pertama. Namun, sektor swasta juga memainkan peran penting.
Tanggung jawab untuk mengelola sistem pendidikan telah berubah secara signifikan dari waktu ke waktu. Di bawah
Orde Baru, rezim yang memerintah Indonesia dari tahun 1965 hingga 1998, pendidikan sangat terpusat. Kementerian Pendidikan
dan Kebudayaan memiliki tanggung jawab utama untuk mengelola semua tingkat sistem pendidikan dengan sejumlah
kementerian dan lembaga pemerintah pusat lainnya yang juga memainkan peran penting. Yang paling penting dari ini adalah
Kementerian Agama, yang bertanggung jawab untuk mendanai sekolah-sekolah Islam dan Perguruan Tinggi negeri dan mengatur
hal-hal yang berkaitan dengan pendidikan agama.
Pada tahun 2001, pemerintah pusat mengalihkan wewenang atas kebijakan dan manajemen pendidikan kepada
pemerintah tingkat kabupaten sejalan dengan desentralisasi, meskipun pergeseran ini tidak meluas ke pendidikan tinggi.
Direktorat Jenderal Pendidikan Tinggi dalam Kementerian Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan terus mengoordinasikan, mengawasi, dan
mengarahkan semua HEI negara dan swasta, sementara Kementerian Agama mempertahankan pengawasan ketat terhadap
jaringan HEI religius. Pada bulan Oktober 2014, Presiden Joko Widodo yang baru terpilih kemudian mengeluarkan Direktorat
Jenderal Pendidikan Tinggi dari Kementerian Pendidikan dan Kebudayaan dan menggabungkannya dengan Kementerian Riset
dan Teknologi, membentuk Kementerian Riset, Teknologi, dan Pendidikan Tinggi yang baru. Kementerian Pendidikan dan
Kebudayaan dibiarkan bertanggung jawab untuk mengelola pendidikan dasar, menengah pertama, dan menengah atas.
Kementerian Agama tetap bertanggung jawab atas sekolah-sekolah agama serta hal-hal yang berkaitan dengan pendidikan agama.
Proximate causes of poor educational quality and learning outcomes in Indonesia

Dalam menjelaskan kualitas hasil pendidikan dan pembelajaran yang buruk di Indonesia, sebagian besar analisis -
khususnya, organisasi pembangunan internasional seperti Bank Dunia, OECD, dan ADB - menunjukkan dampak dari empat
faktor utama.

Yang pertama adalah tingkat pengeluaran pemerintah untuk pendidikan. Meskipun pemerintah Orde Baru berinvestasi
besar-besaran dalam memperluas sistem sekolah selama booming minyak, pemerintah memotong pengeluaran pendidikan secara
signifikan setelah jatuhnya harga minyak internasional pada pertengahan 1980-an. [19] Pada 1995, pengeluarannya hanya 1
persen dari PDB untuk pendidikan, jauh lebih sedikit daripada negara-negara berpenghasilan menengah ke bawah lainnya dan
negara-negara tetangga yang sebanding.Faktor kedua adalah kualitas guru dan dosen Indonesia. Sebelum tahun 2005, sebagian
besar guru Indonesia memiliki kualifikasi tingkat rendah dengan kurang dari 40 persen memegang gelar sarjana empat tahun.
[21] Pada saat yang sama, banyak guru tidak memiliki pengetahuan mata pelajaran dasar dan keterampilan pedagogis untuk
menjadi pendidik yang efektif.Faktor ketiga adalah sistem penghargaan / insentif yang menghambat guru dan dosen Indonesia
untuk memberikan pengajaran berkualitas tinggi dan, dalam hal akademisi universitas, penelitian berkualitas tinggi .Faktor
keempat adalah manajemen pemerintah yang buruk terhadap institusi pendidikan publik, khususnya kontrol pemerintah yang
berlebihan atas kegiatan mereka

Conclution
Analisis ini meneliti alasan mengapa Indonesia sejauh ini gagal mengembangkan sistem pendidikan berkualitas
tinggi yang mampu menghasilkan hasil belajar yang kuat. Dikatakan bahwa hasil ini bukan hanya masalah pendanaan yang tidak
memadai, defisit sumber daya manusia, struktur insentif yang menyimpang, dan manajemen yang buruk. Ini pada dasarnya
adalah masalah politik dan kekuasaan.
The surprising success of the Finnish educational system in a global scenario of commodified
education

REMO MOREIRA BRITO BASTOS2 

2
Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística, Fortaleza, CE, Brazil

ABSTRACT

This paper, supported by bibliographic qualitative research, makes use of state of the art sources
in studies of the educational system of Finland, as well as official government and multilateral
institutions’ documents that investigate and seek to influence national decisions in the area of
education. Additionally, it discusses the emergence, in 2001, of the international recognition of
the the success of the country’s educational model. In view of the astonishing results obtained by
students in the first Programme for International Student Assessment, which was conducted in
2000, we address the factors that contribute to the consistency and the success of Finland’s
educational paradigm. Among the achieved results, emerges the conclusive understanding that
there are successful alternative educational systems that are deeply opposed to the global
corporate standard of education, and which can serve as educational models for other nations.

KEYWORDS: Finland; education; educational system

RESUMO

Este artigo, apoiado em pesquisa qualitativa de cunho bibliográfico, lançando mão de fontes
consideradas o estado da arte em estudos sobre o sistema educacional da Finlândia, bem como
em documentos oficiais de seu governo e de instituições multilaterais que investigam e procuram
influenciar as decisões nacionais sobre a área, aborda a emergência, a partir de 2001, do
reconhecimento internacional do êxito do modelo de educação praticado naquele país. Ante os
surpreendentes resultados obtidos por seus estudantes no primeiro teste do Programa
Internacional de Avaliação de Estudantes, realizado em 2000, são abordados os fatores que
contribuem para a consistência daquele paradigma educacional. Entre os resultados alcançados,
destaca-se o conclusivo entendimento de que existem sistemas educacionais alternativos
exitosos, cujos pressupostos se opõem profundamente ao padrão corporativo global de educação,
os quais podem servir como modelo educacional a ser buscado por outras nações.

PALAVRAS-CHAVE: Finlândia; educação; sistema educacional

RESUMEN

Este artículo, basado en principios de la investigación cualitativa de enfoque bibliográfico,

recurriendo a fuentes consideradas de última generación en estudios sobre el sistema educativo
de Finlandia y a documentos oficiales de su gobierno y de instituciones multilaterales que
investigan e intentan influir en las decisiones nacionales acerca del área, trata sobre la
emergencia, a partir de 2011, del reconocimiento internacional del éxito del modelo educativo
utilizado en aquel país. Ante los sorprendentes resultados logrados en la primera evaluación del
Programa Internacional de Evaluación de Alumnos, en 2000, se abordan los factores que
contribuyen para la solidez de aquel paradigma educativo. De entre los resultados obtenidos, se
destaca el firme entendimiento de que hay sistemas educativos alternativos exitosos, cuyas
premisas se oponen fuertemente al modelo corporativo global de educación, los cuales pueden
servir como un ideal educativo a seguir por las demás naciones.

PALABRAS CLAVE: Finlandia; educación; sistema educativo

INTRODUCTION

Despite serious reservations of significant segments of the world academic community - Bonal and
Tarabini (2013
), Carabaña (2015), Carnoy and Rothstein (2013), Stewart (2013), among others - to which we associate, about
its validity and reliability as a sufficient instrument to gauge the learning of students in the age
range between 15 and 17 years old, as well as the negative consequences of the massive use of
its results as the only criterion for defining the quality of different national education systems,
this paper addresses Finland’s remarkable performance in the tests carried out by the
Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (henceforth OECD) in the
Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) from 2001 to 2012. It also covers its
international repercussions, provoking a wave of analyses and speculations concerning the
accomplishments of that country’s educational system, precisely when the bases of such success
rest on educational conceptions that radically go against those in the hegemonic model advocated
by the canons of the neoliberal ideology.

Starting from the analysis of the Finnish students’ performance in the first round of the aforesaid
test, carried out in 2000, the reactions to these results in Finland are exposed. In the following,
the factors that explain this performance are explored, contrasting them with their counterparts
found in the global corporate education model, and demonstrating how the superior consistency
of those elements present in the Finnish system constitutes the basis of the success of the
educational reforms implemented in that country.

THE IMPACT OF THE RESULTS OF THE PROGRAMME FOR INTERNATIONAL

STUDENT ASSESSMENT (PISA), 2000

Prior to the release of the results of the first round of the PISA tests, on December 2001, there
was a general agreement that countries regarded as world reference in education, such as the
United States, Germany and France, to name a few, enjoyed educational systems which provided
their students with superior instruction, which would entail excellence in academic performance
and consistent learning, ranking themselves among the best in the world. National indicators of
the area - educational attainment, its proportion of investment as a share of the national product,
percentage of people with a higher education degree -, besides the success of its students in
national and international academic competitions, such as Olympics in Physics, Mathematics,
Computing, Chemistry and Biology, for example, reinforced and confirmed the common sense
of the quality of those educational systems.
The dissemination of these results has shaken the world’s academic and political status quo.
Finland, a distant country located at the northern end of the globe, surprisingly, takes the first
places in the three cognitive domains evaluated by the test, namely Mathematics, Science and
Reading, the latter as a priority focus of that round of PISA (whereas, in the 2003 round, priority
was given to Mathematics and, in 2006, to Science).

The Chart 1 shows the performance of that country in the three areas of knowledge, in relation to
the other OECD countries and the other participating nations, not members of this multilateral
organization.

Source: Adapted from Ministry of Education and Culture - Finland [2000].

Chart 1: The results of Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2000. 

By way of comparison with the educational systems hitherto regarded as world-class, the highest
rank obtained by Finland in average performance on the combined reading proficiency scale
(OECD, 2003)1, shown in the first line of the Chart 1, contrasts with the disappointing and surprisingly
poor performance of some of those educational systems, namely France, 15 th position, United
States, 16th, and Germany, 22nd, among others (OECD, 2003). In addition, the relative variation of intra
and inter-school performance in Finland was exceptionally low, reflecting the equity of the
system.

Finnish students’ performance in the following examination rounds (2003, 2006, 2009 e 2012 2)
repeats the excellence standard recorded in the first round, that in 2000, which consolidates the
perception of the consistency and the soundness of the northern European country’s educational
system, awakening the curiosity and the worldwide avalanche of analyses and researches on the
fundamentals and the reasons of the success of its educational model.

THE REACTIONS IN FINLAND

As Sahlberg (2011) points out, the initial reactions following Finland’s first positive results in PISA
within the native educational community were confusing. The world media wanted to know the
secret of its excellent education. In the first 18 months after the publication of those results,
hundreds of official foreign delegations toured all over the country in order to find out how their
schools worked and how their teachers taught. Such was the degree of perplexity and admiration
of foreign visitors over the “Finnish miracle”of PISA that the Finns themselves often could not
manage to answer the questions with the wealth of details the visitors expected.

Yet according to the author, despite all the enthusiasm related to such a “feat”, most educators
and school principals in that nation understands that large-scale standardized tests measure only
a narrow range of the broader spectrum of school learning, and still warn that PISA advocates
the transfer of policies and educational practices to other social formations, which are, in fact,
mostly non-transferable, at least mechanically, as well as alert that their uncritical adoption leads
to a simplistic view of educational improvement.

FACTORS THAT CONTRIBUTE TO THE CONSISTENCY OF THE FINNISH

EDUCATIONAL MODEL

When we consider, in this section, the factors that led the Finnish educational system from a
median performance to the top of the PISA scale3 in the relatively short period of 30 years, we
will contrast those values with those ones that underpin the global corporate model of education,
currently hegemonic, focused on constant large-scale standardized tests and strict control of
teaching work, and structured according to the paradigm underlying business management
techniques.

LOW WITHIN AND BETWEEN SCHOOLS ACHIEVEMENT GAP

The excellence of the Finnish educational system has been favored by its remarkable
homogeneity of performance in and between schools. According to the OECD (2010), no other
country has so little variation in results across schools, and the difference within these schools
among lower and upper-performing students is extremely low. In this sense, Finnish schools are
able to serve all learners well, regardless of their family background or socioeconomic status.

The Chart 2 illustrates well the country’s top performance in low educational gap between
schools, as well as its excellent situation among countries with lower educational gap within
their schools, within their respective national territories, among OECD countries.

Source: Adapted from Sahlberg (2011)

Chart 2: Variance within and between schools in student reading performance on the 2009
Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) Study4. 

To achieve such a feat, Finland decided to abolish tracking5 in its regular general education in
the mid-1980s. As a result, disparities in results between high and low school performance began
to decline. From then on, irrelevantly of their abilities or interests, all students would study the
same subjects of the common curriculum in the same classes, unlike before, when there were
three levels of curricula to be assigned to students according to their previous performance in
those disciplines, but often also based on the influence of their parents.

TEACHERS’ SOCIAL PRESTIGE, AUTONOMY AND WORKING CONDITIONS

Many factors have contributed to the success of Finland’s educational model, but any research
undertaken with minimal bibliographical-empirical depth will reveal that one of these factors
outweighs all others in importance to the consistency and sustainability of the system: their
teachers.

As a corollary of a solid professional preparation (which a subsequent section of this paper

addresses) and of the socio-ethical foundations underlying the exercise of their profession, in line
with the prevailing values in that society, teaching enjoys immense prestige and trust in that
country, as much as medicine, advocacy and other careers of the same reputation in terms of
social value. In this way, the teaching career is lifelong and is one of the most disputed: annually,
more than 20 thousand candidates compete for the position of primary school teacher, and only a
tenth of these can be selected.

It is no wonder, then, that teachers and teaching are highly regarded in Finland. The Finnish
media regularly report results of opinion polls that document favorite professions among general
upper-secondary school graduates. Surprisingly, teaching is consistently rated as one of the most
admired professions, ahead of medical doctors, architects, and lawyers, typically thought to be
dream professions [...]. Teaching is congruent with core social values of Finns, which include
social justice, caring for others, and happiness (Sahlberg, 2011, p. 97, emphasis added).

Accordingly, teachers participate intensely in school planning and curriculum development,

which in that nation is not a competency of the federation, but rather of the municipalities, even
though they follow some general directives outlined by the central government, especially of a
programmatic nature, leaving sufficient room for the municipalities to regulate peculiar aspects
to the local sociocultural reality.

It makes clear that the macroenvironment and the sociopolitical context in which teaching is
exerted in Finland differ significantly from those ones in countries adopting the global corporate
education model (United States, Canada, United Kingdom, among others), whose underlying
paradigm of accountability relies on endless standardized external tests in which student
performance is expected to reflect the quality of teaching work.

Precisely because it is based on a diametrically opposed ethical-educational paradigm, the

Finnish model, characterized by the remarkable professional autonomy of its teachers, surpasses
its neoliberal counterpart. Sahlberg (2011
) summarizes, in a precious way, this key feature of that
nation’s educational system:

Interestingly, practically nobody cites salary6 as a reason for leaving teaching. Instead, many
point out that if they were to lose their professional autonomy in schools and their classrooms,
their career choice would be called into question. For example, if an outside inspector were to
judge the quality of their work or a merit-based compensation policy influenced by external
measures were imposed, many would change their jobs. Finnish teachers are particularly
skeptical of using frequent standardized tests to determine students’ progress in school. Many
Finnish teachers have told me that if they encountered similar external pressure regarding
standardized testing and high-stakes accountability as do their peers in England or the United
States, they would seek other jobs. In short, teachers in Finland expect that they will experience
professional autonomy, prestige, respect, and trust in their work. First and foremost, the working
conditions and moral professional environment are what count as young Finns decide whether
they will pursue a teaching career or seek work in another field ( Sahlberg, 2011, p. 101, emphasis
added).

Teachers’ assessment in Finland is conducted by their own peers in an unstructured way. That is,
there is no formal process, because, as the teaching work is carried out on a cooperative basis, in
teams that are organically intertwined, everyone is responsible for the performance of each one,
since the autonomy they enjoy corresponds to the commitment not only with their teaching
duties but also with the functioning of their schools as a whole. Faced with the identification of
any deficiency in the performance of some educator, this one is aided by the whole team, in a
respectful and supportive way, in order to overcome his/her difficulty, almost always through
training in order to supply the deficiency. Basically, the fundamental value that permeates the
entire Finnish educational system is trust among its members, based on the rigid standard of
professional selection and on the high quality of the pedagogical and ethical training of its staff.

Educational accountability in the Finnish education context preserves and enhances trust among
teachers, students, school leaders, and education authorities, and it involves them in the process,
offering them a strong sense of professional responsibility and initiative. Shared responsibility
for teaching and learning characterizes how educational accountability is arranged in Finland.
Parents, students, and teachers prefer smart accountability that enables schools to keep the focus
on learning and permit more degrees of freedom in curriculum planning, compared to the
external standardized testing culture that prevails in some other nations (Sahlberg, 2011, p. 154).

Still according to Sahlberg (2011), educational authorities and parents understand that education is a
highly complex process to be measured and evaluated by purely quantitative parameters, because
in the educational system of that nation the existing operative principle is that quality is defined
by mutual interaction between schools and students along with parents.

Another feature of the Finnish educational model that contributes decisively to the effectiveness
and fluidity of the system is the decentralization of decision-making power to the local
authorities, i.e., municipalities and schools, which are now responsible for curriculum planning,
implementation and the assessment of educational policy at the local level. This is a remarkable
administrative, pedagogical and financial autonomy, since, according to Hautamäki et al. (2008), in 68.1%
of schools a professor-director, with the local educational authorities, formulates the budget of
those institutions, a percentage that is only 35.1% in the OECD countries.

As stated by those authors, with the extinction of the national inspection of didactic material
occurred in the early 1990s, all schools and their teachers began to choose the books to be used,
which occurs in only 83.5% of the countries of that multilateral organization:

The culture of trust [widespread throughout that society] means that education authorities and
national level education policymakers believe that teachers, together with principals,
headmasters and parents, know how to provide the best possible education for children and youth
at a certain level. Also, the parents trust teachers (Hautamäki et al., 2008, p. 87).

By being educated to be autonomous and reflective professionals, it is not only Finnish teachers’
task to implement in their locality measures determined in a central national instance, as in the
global corporate model of education, but rather to effectively participate in decision-making
processes, that is another aspect in which the greatest maturity and consistency of the educational
model practiced in that Nordic country is manifested.

EQUALITY OF OPPORTUNITIES AS THE FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLE OF THE

FINNISH EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM

Probably the most discrepant feature of the Finnish educational system vis-à-vis its neoliberal
hegemonic congener in the remainder of the world is the basic principle of general and
compulsory education for all children, irrespective of any of their intrinsic or extrinsic
conditions.
Sahlberg (2015
, p. 75) points out that in Finland equity means having a socially fair and inclusive
education system that provides everyone the opportunity to fulfill their intentions and their
dreams through education, which transcends mere universal access to school. In the words of this
educator:

People sometimes incorrectly assume that equity in education means all students should be
taught the same curriculum, or should achieve the same learning outcomes in school. This was
also a common belief in Finland for a long time following the equality-based school reform that
was first launched in the early 1970s. Rather, equity in education 7 means that all students must
have access to high-quality education, regardless of where they live, who their parents might be,
or what school they attend. In this sense, equity ensures that differences in educational outcomes
are not the result of differences in wealth, income, power or possessions - in other words, home
background.

Known as Peruskoulu and implemented since the early 1970s, this principle has thenceforth-
structured basic education in that country, in which all students learn together in comprehensive
schools8. Sahlberg (2011, p. 51) outlines the overall lines of the idea:

The central idea of Peruskoulu [...] was to merge existing grammar schools, civic schools, and
primary schools into a comprehensive 9-year municipal school. This meant that the placement of
students after 4 years of primary education into grammar and civic streams 9 would come to an
end. All students, regardless of their domicile, socioeconomic background, or interests would
enroll in the same 9-year basic schools governed by local education authorities. This
implementation was revolutionary.

As expected, critics of the new system argued that it was not possible to have the same
educational expectations towards children coming from different social and intellectual
backgrounds, and that Finland’s future as a developed industrial nation was at stake since
performance of national education would have to be adjusted downward in order to
accommodate the less talented students. In spite of being minority in that society, which was
permeated by a broad cultural and political consensus on the fundamental lines of their
educational system (OECD, 2007), these segments only weakened their particularistic and
“meritocratic”discourse in 2001, with the publication of the results of the first PISA’s
international tests, which indicated that strong commitment to the principle of equity, established
at the beginning of the reforms, has lead to consistent results.

It was clear that success came precisely from the ethical-political choice of not seeking to create
small geniuses, but rather to raise the performance of each child, without distinction. That is, to
raise national performance in terms of learning by supporting all learners, not just a privileged
minority, as it occurs in the global corporate education model, which segregates students into
subgroups based on their previous or expected performance10.

As a reflection of the adoption of the principle of equity, more than 99% of students in the ideal
age group in Finland successfully complete compulsory basic education; about 95% continue to
be educated in secondary schools; of those, 93% complete their courses; and more than 60%
enroll in higher education. All education in that country, from preschool to post-graduation, is
completely tuition-free for all students11 (Sahlberg, 2011).

Regarding higher education, the Finnish system is one of the most equitable in the world. The
Higher Education Strategy Associates, based in Toronto, Canada, compares standards of equity
and equality in higher education in different countries. Its Global Higher Education Ranking
(Usher; Medow, 2010) compares the accessibility of higher education for residents in 17 countries. The
study presents data concerning six different indicators of affordability 12 and four of
accessibility13. The big winner on both criteria in 2010 was Finland.

It is difficult not to realize that, in accordance with the prevailing social policy paradigm in that
country, it is overwhelmingly understood that the expenses incurred by its educational system
constitute an investment of unquestionable relevance for the whole society, and not a weighty
cost on the national economy.

CONSISTENT TEACHER EDUCATION OF EXCELLENCE NECESSARILY LINKED TO

RESEARCH

Congruently with the superior quality standard presented in the other dimensions of its
educational system, Finnish teachers’ training is one of the pillars of the excellence and success
of its education model.
Since the late 1970s, all teacher education programs have been operating only in universities, and
the master’s degree has become the minimum qualification for teaching in that country’s
schools14. According to Uusiautti e Määttä (2013, p. 6):

The purpose was to provide all teachers with as high a quality of knowledge as possible, based
on the latest research. In addition, teachers had to be prepared to follow and exploit the newest
research findings in their teaching. This laid the foundation for the idea of seeing teachers as
researchers in their own field of work. Teachers were expected to work with an open and critical
mind and to contribute to the development of their profession.

Simultaneously, the scientific content and the advances of pedagogical research began to enrich
the curriculum of teacher training, which had then assumed an academic nature, in the sense that
the teachers adopted, in their work, a critical and analytical perspective, oriented to research, so
as to focus their activities not only in the classroom, but also in school planning and evaluation
activities and in curriculum development, in which they participate, along with principals and
local education authorities, notably as a corollary of the high standard of their professional and
intellectual training (Sahlberg, 2011).

Even the World Bank, a staunch advocate, diffuser and implementer of the global corporate
education model on the capitalist periphery, recognizes, in a study produced by its education
research team (Aho; Pitkänen; Sahlberg, 2006), that, compared to its counterpart in other countries, Finnish
teacher training stands out for its depth and breadth 15. Its balance between theoretical and
practical learning helps young teachers to understand the various teaching methods as well as the
dynamics of the correlation between teaching and learning.

With such high expertise and professional prestige, nothing could be more expected than the
motivation that leads teachers to engage in the processes of educational development in their
own schools, as well as in national and international projects. Besides that, educators
spontaneously continue to enhance their own professional knowledge and skills, considering the
support they receive from the state in this dimension a right, not an obligation, as it occurs in
prescriptive educational systems based on teacher accountability as justification for neoliberal
reforms.

Another multilateral organization, the OECD, in a sectoral paper entitled “Strong performers and
successful reformers in education. Lessons from PISA for Korea” ( OECD, 2014c, p.175), emphasizes
how Finland has created a virtuous circle around self-respect and autonomy for its teachers:

High status and good working conditions - small classes, adequate support for counsellors and
special needs teachers, a voice in school decisions, low levels of discipline problems, high levels
of professional autonomy - create large pools of applicants, leading to highly selective and
intensive teacher-preparation programmes. This, in turn, leads to success in the early years of
teaching, relative stability of the teacher workforce, success in teaching (of which PISA results
are only one example), and a continuation of the high status of teaching.

It should be noted that Sahlberg (2011) points out that the high professional status of teachers in
Finnish society is a cultural phenomenon, but that their theoretical and pedagogical ability in the
classroom and their enthusiastic and contagious involvement in the collaborative activities
developed in networks of professional communities have their roots in the very model of teacher
training, systematically delineated and implemented since the late 1970s, as well as in the ethical
and epistemological foundation and in the values that guide the system. In other words, the
political option to invest heavily in the formation of the national faculty was clearly assumed and
effectively adopted by that society.

WHEN LESS MEANS MORE

The discrepancy between the Finnish educational model and its neoliberal counterpart manifests
notably in the theoretical and methodological options of the former, which prioritize the
consistency and quality of the formative processes, rather than the short term quest for
quantitative results through usually discontinuous efforts, clearly uncoordinated among
themselves and ineffective from the pedagogical point of view, a modus operandi which is
characteristic of the global corporate model of education.

In the educational paradigm in use in the Nordic country, an increase in class hours beyond the
reasonable time lapse that balances the student’s motivation, commitment and discipline, with
the aim of compensating for a deficient level of learning, generates an opposite effect. It is being
understood that long and intensive class days without appropriate intervals lead to fatigue, not to
the maturation of learning, which is only acquired in longer periods and as a corollary of
processes that harmonize the physical, psychological and social dimensions of the student’s
development. The same rationale applies, similarly, to the burden of homework assignments and
standardized learning tests to which students are subjected.
Sahlberg (2011
) points out that nations with the best performances in the PISA tests in all cognitive
domains (Finland, South Korea and Japan, for example) devote fewer hours to formal instruction
in the classroom, which means that students in these educational systems attend on average two
years of formal pre-tertiary education less than their counterparts in other countries with opposite
educational policies. This difference is further reinforced by the fact that compulsory basic
education in Finland starts only at the age of 7, not at 5, as in most of the other countries.

Another mode of observing this paradox would be to examine the distribution of teachers’ work
hours in the various national educational systems, between hours of effective classroom
instruction and hours in other teaching activities. According to Sahlberg (2011), between the 6th and 8th
grades of elementary education, Finnish teachers teach approximately 600 hours per year in
classrooms, the lowest working hours among OECD countries, while, according to this
organization, in the United States the total annual average time of teachers in classroom, in the
same series, is 1,080 hours16.

The quality versus quantity paradox manifests itself in the same way in the issue of assigning
homework for students. Once again, Finland leads a ranking of educational systems in OECD
countries, this time with the lowest weekly workload among 38 surveyed nations, 2.9 hours,
compared to 6.1 hours in the United States, 6 hours in Australia and in Hong Kong, 5.5 hours in
Canada and Belgium, among other countries, with the OECD average being 4.9 hours (OECD, 2014a).
It should be noted that Singapore, Hong Kong (China) and Macao (China), countries/instances
whose students perform similarly to their Finnish peers in the PISA tests, do so at the expense of
strenuous hours after school, in private educational institutions that already constitute an
economically significant industry in those nations. Contrary to this view, there is no mentoring or
reinforcement in Finland other than those offered at the school itself, which the pupil attends
when this becomes necessary (Sahlberg, 2011). The results of PISA 2003 have indicated the success of
the Finnish option:

There is considerable cross-country variation in the degree to which students feel anxiety when
dealing with mathematics, with students in France, Italy, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Spain, and
Turkey reporting feeling most concerned and students in Denmark, Finland, the Netherlands and
Sweden least concerned [...]. For example, more than half of the students in France and Japan
report that they get very tense when they have to do mathematics homework, but only 7 per cent
of students in Finland and the Netherlands report this. It is noteworthy that Finland and the
Netherlands are also two of the top performing countries (OCDE, 2005, p. 138).

Another feature of the Finnish educational system discrepant from the global corporate education
model is the nearly complete absence of standardized performance tests outside schools. Its
students only face tests of this type at the end of elementary school, at the age of 18 or 19, with a
view to entering universities.

Indeed, school evaluation in the Finnish model is based on principles diametrically opposed to
those prevailing in its neoliberal counterpart. In the latter, competition between schools, students
and teachers permeates the whole system, leading them to “teach and study for the tests”, which
are punitive for members of the said triad that do not reach the performance set as a minimum
acceptable standard. In the opposite direction, Hargreaves, Halász and Pont (2008, p.86) identify in self-
assessment the key to the continuous improvement of the educational system of Finland.

Finland does not have a system of standardised testing or test-based accountability. It does not
have systems of competitive choice between schools or order its schools in public performance
rankings. In the words of school leadership training providers we met, “all schools must be good
enough and there is no reason to have elite schools and bad schools.” If schools have difficulty,
the government does not intervene punitively but opts for self-correcting systems of support and
assistance. There is an emphasis on evaluation for improvement, especially through school self-
evaluation which is incorporated into national evaluations. Through this system of self-
evaluation, networking, participation and co-operation, the system is able to “build cooperative
structures and hear the weak signals.” The system then responds to these through training,
support and assistance from the municipality and other schools in ways that are calmly co-
operative rather than dramatic or crisis-driven.

Again, the results of PISA seem to indicate the perspicacy of the Nordic nation as far as the
evaluation policy of its educational system is concerned. By analyzing the results of the 2000,
2003, 2006, and 2012 rounds of that OECD survey, Sahlberg (2011) identifies a downward trend in
average mathematical17 performance in the series in question, notably among students from the
United States, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, Japan, and some states in Canada and
Australia, precisely those countries that have opted for educational evaluation policies heavily
focused on accountability through intensive use of high stake external tests.

Moving in the opposite direction, the successful Finnish school system, during the same period
investigated, has emphasized investment in teacher improvement, participative development of
curricula, leadership and collaborative networks between schools, processes in which the guiding
element of the whole philosophy of the system, which permeates all dimensions involved, is
mutual trust among all participants.

Although this correlation pointed out by Sahlberg (2011), per se, does not necessarily prove the failure
of educational reform policies focused on high-stake external tests, it clearly shows that the
resort to the use of a physical, logistic and personnel structure involved in the design and
operationalization of these standardized tests as appropriate instruments to carry out the
evaluation of the education system is not a necessary condition for improving the quality of
education, as the Finnish model, moving in the opposite direction, has demonstrated this.
According to the researcher:

Testing itself is not a bad thing and I am not an antiassessment person. Problems arise when they
become higher in stakes and include sanctions to teachers or schools as a consequence of poor
performance. There are alarming reports from many parts of the world where high-stakes tests
have been employed as part of accountability policies in education [...]. This evidence suggests
that teachers tend to redesign their teaching according to these tests, give higher priority to those
subjects that are tested, and adjust teaching methods to drilling and memorizing information
rather than understanding knowledge. Since there are no standardized high-stakes tests in
Finland prior to the matriculation examination at the end of upper-secondary education, the
teacher can focus on teaching and learning without the disturbance of frequent tests to be passed
(Sahlberg, 2011, p. 92).

In fact, what emerges from the rationale of the evaluative strategy incorporated into the
educational system of that country is that, by prioritizing creativity and respecting and
accompanying the learning pace of each learner, enables their cognitive development to have as
parameter their own features and abilities, and not uniform patterns externally determined by
statistical indicators. As the OECD itself acknowledges (2011, p. 127):

Accountability in the Finnish system is built from the bottom up. Teacher candidates are selected
in part based on their ability to convey their belief in the core mission of public education in
Finland, which is deeply moral and humanistic as well as civic and economic. The preparation
they receive is designed to build a powerful sense of individual responsibility for the learning
and well-being of all the students in their care. [...] The level of trust that the larger community
extends to its schools seems to engender a strong sense of collective responsibility for the
success of every student.

Because it is a teachers and schools’ duty, which enjoy, as public institutions, broad respect and
trust as a corollary of the high social cohesion and high standard of living existing in the country,
the Finnish school and teachers evaluation policy distinguishes itself from the “witch-hunt” style
that characterizes its counterpart in the global corporate model of education, notedly in Anglo-
Saxon countries, featured by the annihilation of trust and cohesion between the groups involved
in the educational dynamics, generating suspicion, discredit and low morale among educators.

The following section addresses the current configuration of the Finnish educational system.

HOW THE EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM OF FINLAND IS STRUCTURED18

Currently, the educational system in Finland has the following configuration:

 Infant education: offered up to 6 years old, when, then, children are entitled to one year
of pre-schooling (optional) in order to smooth the transition to basic education.
 Basic education: to be accomplished at the basic common school (comprehensive
schools), from the age of 7, with compulsory attendance for nine years. Although unified,
in the first six years, basic education is sometimes referred to as “primary education”,
and, in the last three years, as the “first cycle of secondary education”, according to the
International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED), which distinguishes between
primary education, lower secondary education and upper secondary education.
 Secondary education: corresponds to the second level of secondary education of the
aforementioned classification, with non-compulsory attending and split in two paths: the
general education, chosen by those who pursue the academic career or areas related to the
humanities, or the vocational and training education, indicated for those who intend to
work as technicians in companies and private organizations in general. Usually carried
out in three years, it precedes higher education, to which access is obtained, for
universities, upon passing the entrance examinations and, for universities of applied
sciences (UAS), by means of proof of professional experience and satisfactory academic
performance.
 Higher education: divided into universities and UAS, includes baccalaureates (three years
in universities and three and a half to four years in UAS), master’s degrees (two years in
universities and one and a half year in UAS) and the doctorates. The master’s degree
enables for full teaching in non-higher education, but a great number of teachers and
researchers advance to doctorate (Figure 1).
Source: Adapted from Ministry Of Education And Culture - Finland (2017).

Figure 1: Current educational system in Finland. 

The completion rates achieved by the educational system of the Nordic nation are really striking:
basic education, 99%; general secondary education, 94%; and professional secondary education,
90%. With regard to attendance and accessibility, 98% of their children attend pre-school
education, and 60% of young people study in higher education institutions, a rate
overwhelmingly higher than the OECD average, around 25%.

GENERAL EVALUATION AND REPRODUCTIVITY OF THE MODEL IN OTHER

COUNTRIES

Finland’s educational system has managed to remain relatively immune to the global
subsumption of this sphere to some capitalist market mechanisms, which engender educational
models based on competition between students, schools, and nations, with their endless high-
stake tests fad, and the obsessive blaming of teachers for their student’s precarious performance,
a mispractice prevalent in most national states where governments are guided by the neoliberal
economic recipe. The Finnish educational policy, whose majority of assumptions and paradigms
are opposite to those found in the correspondent systems of those countries, is closely
intertwined with the other social policies carried out by that State19.
These achievements provide the basis for a desirable and beneficial assimilation of the positive
aspects of the Finnish experience by other nations with a view to improving their educational
systems. It is important, notwithstanding, to harmonize satisfactorily two issues that are often
dealt with in a dichotomous way, concealing the complexity of the reproducibility of the
educational practices adopted by the Nordic country in other national formations.

It is necessary to comprehend that the Finland’s model success has not “fallen from the blue sky
like a lightning on a sunny day”, but it was embedded in a broad and participatory nation project,
as mentioned before. Shortcuts and short-term “solutions” that characterize the modus operandi
of the current capitalist phase, in their congenial and obsessive eagerness to competition, do not
produce the necessary consistency in order to solidify the proper foundations for the
development of a fair and effective system.

Thus, the success of Finland’s educational system results from a set of social, cultural, political,
economic, and ethical-moral factors that have shaped that society in the last 70 years and from a
conscious and deliberate project, by that social body, in the same period, in order to create the
basis for building a modern, prosperous, equitable and just nation. The strength of the national
consensus around this mission is reflected, among other manifestations, in the solid permanence
and consolidation of its free public education system since the early 1970s, regardless of the
ideological profile of the political parties that were in charge throughout this period, as well as in
the strong resistance to the pressures of the global capitalist macrostructure, with a view to
subsuming the education system of that country to the mechanisms of reproduction and
accumulation of capital concentrated in the immense transnational monopolistic financial
conglomerates20.

Just as the efforts to mechanically transport to other countries and try to reproduce only certain
aspects that have proved effective in the Finnish model are obviously innocuous, the accurate
analysis of this model shows that the construction of the educational system itself takes place in
the broad scope of the formulation and development of the welfare state set up in the nation since
the dawn of the 1970s.

From this perspective, education is integrated into the entire framework of public policies in that
State, which supports and makes it an indispensable basis for social cohesion and the
socioeconomic development of that nation. Attempting to reproduce an educational system with
the values, foundations, principles and objectives found in the Finnish model in a foreign society
characterized by high levels of social inequality and misery, absence of a minimally democratic
political system and high levels of income concentration and economic power will prove to be a
fruitless and frustrating experience.

On the other hand, the relative peculiarity of some features of the Finnish society, State and
educational system should not serve as a pretext for disregarding its model as an educational
paradigm to be sought by other nations, naturally through a process of mutual learning,
collaboration and interaction among participants in the systems in comparison, aiming at the
necessary adaptations to their respective social, cultural, political and economic contexts.
One of the claims of those who share such a misunderstanding has been that the small territorial
extension and the small population of Finland are absent in many other countries, which would
make its system unviable as a pattern to be considered in the educational policy formulations of
other nations. The argument falls apart when one learns the fact that, for example, 30 of the 50
states of the United States have a population similar in size to that of this Nordic country, it
being known that these political and administrative instances have, in the United States, for
example, considerable administrative, pedagogical and financial autonomy to formulate their
educational policies. Therefore, no structural factor would, per se, prevent them from considering
the alternatives adopted by the successful model of that northern European country.

Another similarly mistaken idea points to the supposed ethnic and cultural homogeneity that
allegedly exists in Finland, which does not occur in large countries trying to reformulate their
educational systems. This trait has gradually lost relevance and intensity in that society in recent
decades, with the upsurge of migratory processes coming mainly from other European countries.
However, what is striking is that, as Sahlberg (2011) reminds us, this same relative homogeneity can be
found in Japan, South Korea, and Shanghai, whose educational systems are often taken as
benchmarks by market-driven educational reformers, which demonstrates its fragility as an
argument justifying the alleged inapplicability of the Finnish experience in other countries.

Indeed, in addition to the difficult reproduction in other national formations of some of the
aforementioned factors of the success of Finland’s educational system, notably those of a
sociocultural nature, it is hard to believe that societies affected by social inequality, as well as
those characterized by an individualistic and competitive ethos - like the Anglo-Saxon nations -,
are able to assimilate the fundamental values that have guided and marked the success of the
“Finnish way.”

Nonetheless, it has been realized that there are reasonably successful alternative education
systems, whose assumptions are profoundly opposed to the overall corporate pattern of
education, which can enable the nations victims of this ruse the possibility of cooperative
development, with the participation of the broader segments of society, of an autonomous model
compatible with the values of equality, dignity, fraternity and solidarity that guide the social
groups that have already understood and matured the basic link between equity and social

Keberhasilan Mengejutkan Dari Sistem Pendidikan Finlandia Dalam Skenario Global Pendidikan Terkomodifikasi

ABSTRAK

Jurnal ini, didukung oleh penelitian kualitatif bibliografi, memanfaatkan sumber-sumber canggih dalam studi tentang sistem
pendidikan Finlandia, serta dokumen resmi pemerintah dan lembaga-lembaga multilateral yang menyelidiki dan berupaya untuk
mempengaruhi keputusan nasional di bidang pendidikan. Selain itu, ini membahas kemunculan, pada tahun 2001, pengakuan
internasional atas keberhasilan model pendidikan negara. Mengingat hasil menakjubkan yang diperoleh oleh siswa dalam
Program pertama untuk Penilaian Siswa Internasional, yang dilakukan pada tahun 2000, kami membahas faktor-faktor yang
berkontribusi terhadap konsistensi dan keberhasilan paradigma pendidikan Finlandia. Di antara hasil yang dicapai, muncul
pemahaman konklusif bahwa ada sistem pendidikan alternatif yang berhasil yang sangat bertentangan dengan standar pendidikan
perusahaan global, dan yang dapat berfungsi sebagai model pendidikan untuk negara lain.
INTRODUCTION

Meskipun ada keberatan serius dari segmen signifikan komunitas akademik dunia - Bonal dan Tarabini (2013), Carabaña
(2015), Carnoy dan Rothstein (2013), Stewart (2013), antara lain - yang kami asosiasikan, tentang validitas dan keandalannya
sebagai instrumen yang memadai untuk mengukur pembelajaran siswa dalam kisaran usia antara 15 dan 17 tahun, serta
konsekuensi negatif dari penggunaan besar-besaran dari hasilnya sebagai satu-satunya kriteria untuk menentukan kualitas
berbagai sistem pendidikan nasional.
Mulai dari analisis kinerja siswa Finlandia di babak pertama tes tersebut di atas, yang dilakukan pada tahun 2000, reaksi
terhadap hasil ini di Finlandia terpapar. Berikut ini, faktor-faktor yang menjelaskan kinerja ini dieksplorasi, kontras dengan
rekan-rekan mereka yang ditemukan dalam model pendidikan perusahaan global, dan menunjukkan bagaimana konsistensi
unggul dari unsur-unsur yang ada dalam sistem Finlandia merupakan dasar keberhasilan reformasi pendidikan.
diimplementasikan di negara itu.

PRESTIGE SOSIAL GURU, KONDISI OTONOMI DAN KERJA

Banyak faktor yang berkontribusi terhadap keberhasilan model pendidikan Finlandia, tetapi setiap penelitian yang dilakukan
dengan kedalaman bibliografi-empiris minimal akan mengungkapkan bahwa salah satu faktor ini melebihi semua faktor lain yang
penting bagi konsistensi dan keberlanjutan sistem: guru mereka.

Oleh karena itu, para guru secara intens berpartisipasi dalam perencanaan sekolah dan pengembangan kurikulum, yang di
negara itu bukan kompetensi federasi, tetapi lebih dari kotamadya, meskipun mereka mengikuti beberapa arahan umum yang
digariskan oleh pemerintah pusat, terutama yang bersifat programatis, meninggalkan ruang yang cukup bagi kotamadya untuk
mengatur aspek-aspek khusus pada realitas sosiokultural lokal.

EDUCATION SYSTEM FINLAND

Saat ini, sistem pendidikan di Finlandia memiliki konfigurasi berikut:

• Pendidikan bayi: ditawarkan hingga 6 tahun, ketika, kemudian, anak-anak berhak atas satu tahun pra-sekolah (opsional) untuk
memperlancar transisi ke pendidikan dasar.
• Pendidikan dasar: akan dicapai di sekolah umum dasar (sekolah komprehensif), sejak usia 7 tahun, dengan kehadiran wajib
selama sembilan tahun. Meskipun disatukan, dalam enam tahun pertama, pendidikan dasar kadang-kadang disebut sebagai
"pendidikan dasar", dan, dalam tiga tahun terakhir, sebagai "siklus pertama pendidikan menengah", menurut Klasifikasi
Pendidikan Standar Internasional (ISCED) , yang membedakan antara pendidikan dasar, pendidikan menengah bawah dan
pendidikan menengah atas.
• Pendidikan menengah: sesuai dengan tingkat kedua pendidikan menengah dari klasifikasi yang disebutkan di atas, dengan tidak
wajib menghadiri dan dibagi dalam dua jalur: pendidikan umum, yang dipilih oleh mereka yang mengejar karir akademik atau
bidang-bidang yang berkaitan dengan humaniora, atau kejuruan dan pelatihan pendidikan, diindikasikan bagi mereka yang
berniat bekerja sebagai teknisi di perusahaan dan organisasi swasta pada umumnya. Biasanya dilakukan dalam tiga tahun, itu
mendahului pendidikan tinggi, yang aksesnya diperoleh, untuk universitas, setelah lulus ujian masuk dan, untuk universitas ilmu
terapan (UAS), melalui bukti pengalaman profesional dan kinerja akademik yang memuaskan.

• Pendidikan tinggi: dibagi menjadi universitas dan UAS, termasuk sarjana muda (tiga tahun di universitas dan tiga setengah
sampai empat tahun di UAS), gelar master (dua tahun di universitas dan satu setengah tahun di UAS) dan doktor. Tingkat master
memungkinkan untuk pengajaran penuh dalam pendidikan non-tinggi, tetapi sejumlah besar guru dan peneliti melanjutkan ke
doktor .

CONCLUTION

Dengan demikian, keberhasilan sistem pendidikan Finlandia dihasilkan dari serangkaian faktor sosial, budaya, politik, ekonomi,
dan moral-moral yang telah membentuk masyarakat itu dalam 70 tahun terakhir dan dari proyek yang disengaja dan disengaja,
oleh badan sosial itu, di periode yang sama, untuk menciptakan dasar untuk membangun negara yang modern, makmur, adil dan
adil.
The Education System in Singapore
Abstract
This chapter introduces the education system in Singapore by discussing its educational
developments since its independence, its current educational system, its salient features and the
key challenges it faces in an age of globalisation. The first part delineates the three phases of
educational development in Singapore: ‘survival-driven’, ‘efficiency-driven’, and ‘ability-
driven’. The second part of the chapter describes the current educational system in
Singapore,from pre-school education to university education. It also highlights three salient
features of the current system: an educational system that offers different types of schools and
programmes, a curriculum that fosters customised and inter-disciplinary study, and the changing
role of teachers from just experts and dispensers of content knowledge to resource persons to
facilitate the students’ learning through creative and student-centred activities. The last part of
the chapter highlights two key challenges facing Singapore in an era of globalisation: to manage
the increasing cultural diversity in the educational landscape in Singapore, and to enhance the
professionalism of the pre-school teachers so as to raise the teacher and education quality in the
pre-school sector.
Key Words: education system, Singapore, survival-driven, efficiency-driven, ability-driven,
Thinking School, Learning Nation

Introduction
Among the Asian educational systems, Singapore stands out for its stellar academic
performance in international assessments. For example, the primary 4 and secondary 2 students
in Singapore have consistently outperformed students from other countries in mathematics and
science in the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS). In the most
recent TIMSS 2011, Singaporean students were ranked in the first two positions for both the
subjects and grades (Martin, Mullis, Foy & Stanco, 2012; Mullis, Martin, Foy & Arora, 2012).
Singapore also emerged among the top performing economies in the 2009 and 2012 Programme
for International Student Assessment (PISA) for reading, mathematics and science (OECD,
2015). The latest achievement was its number one position in the global school ranking
organised by Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) among 76
countries based on test scores in mathematics and science (Coughlan, 2015). Singapore’s
education system has been acknowledged as a “sustained improver” and described as “Great” in
the McKinsey report (McKinsey, 2010).
The impressive academic performance of Singapore within a short span of fifty years signifies
that it has achieved educational success, with the support of an effective school system, well-run
schools, highly qualified teachers and resilient students. It is therefore instructive to understand
the evolution, success factors and on-going challenges of the educational system in
Singapore.This chapter introduces the education system in Singapore by discussing its
educational developments since its independence, its current educational system, its salient
features and the key challenges it faces in an age of globalisation.

Educational Developments in Singapore

Singapore was a British colony in the 19th century, achieved self-government in 1959
and became an independent nation in 1965. The early days were difficult as Singapore struggled
to survive. The ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) government, under the leadership of the
lateLee Kuan Yew, put in place a series of pragmatic social and economic policies to attract
industrial investments from the international community. Today, Singapore is a vibrant
cosmopolitan city with one of the world’s busiest ports and airports, as well as an educational
system that has been internationally acknowledged as successful. In understanding the
educational system in Singapore, it is helpful to note that there were three phases in the
education developments in Singapore since its independence (Tan, 2008). The first phase was
‘survival-driven’ where the aim was to produce trained workers in the early years of Singapore’s
independence and industrialisation (Chen, 2000). Industralisation in late 1960s demanded that
Singapore produce sufficient skilled workers for an export-oriented economy. Responding to this
demand, there was a shift in emphasis from academic to technical education, characterised by the
development of post-secondary technical and vocational education at the polytechnics (Ho &
Gopinathan, 1999).
This reflects the instrumental aim of education to educate students for the workforce
through linguistic and technical skills. Another major reform was the the introduction of
bilingualism and bilingual policy in1966. Bilingualism in Singapore is defined not as proficiency
in any two languages but as proficiency in the English Language (EL) which is recognised as the
first language, and a second language, known as ‘Mother Tongue Language’ (MTL). All students
in Singapore must study two languages in schools: the English Language (EL) and their Mother
Tongue Language (MTL). Three MTLs have been selected by the government for students in
Singapore – Chinese Language (CL) or Mandarin for Chinese students, Malay Language (ML)
for Malay students, and Tamil Language (TL) for Indian students (five more Indian languages
have since been added to cater to the diverse linguistic needs of the Indian students).
Pragmatically, the choice of English as the first language was motivated by pragmatic
considerations since it was and still is the language of commerce, of science, technology and
international intercourse. This smart move gave Singapore students a head start in employment
opportunities in Asia and accessing to the science and technology of the West. The ‘survival-
driven’ phase was replaced by the ‘efficiency-driven’ phase in the late 1970s that aimed to fine
tuned the system in order to produce skilled workers for the economy in the most efficient
way.In other words, the government projected the manpower demands in various sectors of the
economy and train people to fit into jobs in those sectors (Teo, 1999). A timely report, Report on
the Ministry of Education in 1979, highlighted the problem of inefficiency in the 1970s where
about 20-30% of students dropped out of the system because they could not cope with learning
two languages (Ministry of Education, 1979). At the same time, those who passed both
languages were struggling and not effectively bilingual. The conclusion of the report was that the
education system was “one-size-fits-all” and did not cater to students of different needs and
abilities. The report recommended greater efficiency by introducing ability-based streaming at
the end of primary 3 and an additional year of study for the weakest students in secondary
schools. Students were assessed primarily on their level of languages and mathematics, and
streamed into different courses at the primary and secondary schools.
Further educational changes were introduced in the mid 1980s due to changing economic
circumstances during that decade. Singapore was affected by the recession in mid 1980s that revealed
that the country’s labour force was under-educated compared to those in the US, Taiwan and Japan
(Gopinathan, 2001). In 1987, a report, Towards Excellence in Schools, called for a number of policy
initiatives to produce students who are educated, creative and innovative. Consequently, some top
secondary schools were selected in 1988 to become ‘independent schools’ where the school leaders
were given greater autonomy in the running of the schools and encouraged to spearhead innovative and
educationally meaningful programmes, activities and pedagogy (Principals’ Report, 1987). The report
also suggested improvements in vocational and industrial training programmes to ensure that Singapore
stayed ahead in having skilled workers for the economy. Again, one can see the pragmatic influence in
the priority of training professionals and technicians with the requisite knowledge and skills.
Another major educational change was to fine-tune the streaming system where students were placed
in different academic tracks based on their exam results obtained at the Primary School Leaving
Examination (PSLE). In addition to the Express, Special, and Normal (Academic) streams, a Normal
(Technical) stream was introduced in 1994 to cater to the weakest students in secondary schools; they
would receive a special curriculum with subjects such as English, mother tongue, mathematics,
computer applications and technical studies taught at their level. These students will be channelled to
the Institute of Technical Education (ITE) after theirsecondary years to learn technical skills. These
changes meant that all students would have at least 10 years of education in primary and secondary
schools before they specialise in different areas of study. The government succeded in having 20% of the
primary 1 cohort receiving technical-vocational education at the ITE, 40% polytechnic education and
another 20% university education (Ho & Gopinathan, 1999). The last and current phase is ‘ability-
driven’ that started in 1997. It was launched under the ‘Thinking Schools, Learning Nation’
(TSLN) vision that aspires to develop creative thinking skills, a lifelong passion for learning, and
nationalistic commitment in the young (Tan, 2011) The former Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong
explained that the goal is to nurture thinking and committed citizens who actively engage in life-
long learning within a national culture of learning (Goh, 1997). The former Minister of
Education Tharman Shanmugaratnam stated that the government seeks to gradually reduce the
emphasis on examinations and focus on a holistic education; give the students more choice in
their studies so that they can shape and enjoy their learning; and encourage teachers to bring
quality and innovative practices into the classroom and school (Tharman, 2004). Under the
TSLN vision, an ‘ability-driven’ education is premised on the belief that all talents and abilities
are equally valuable and will be equally nurtured. This means that a diversity of talents, be it in
the intellect, the arts, sports, or community endeavours, is treasured and developed in all students
based on their interests and potentials.

Current Education System in Singapore

This section gives a brief overview of the current educational system in Singapore. The
majority of the schools from the primary to the pre-university levels are state schools (known
locally as ‘national schools’) under the Ministry of Education (MOE). This means that these
schools are administratively controlled and funded by the MOE. Prior to primary school,
children may be enrolled in a pre-school institution that is for children aged 4 to 6 years. Parents
could choose to enroll their children in a private or government-run kindergarten. Pre-school
children in Singapore generally learn basic literacy and numeracy skills as well as bilingualism:
English as the first language and a second language such as Chinese, Malay and Tamil. The
MOE acknowledges that the early years are crucial for children’s holistic development, and that
a quality pre-school education will provide children with opportunities to build their self-
confidence, learn social skills and develop learning dispositions. The Ministry has therefore
raised the quality of kindergarten education by implementing the following measures: developed
curriculum resources to support educators in designing quality learning experiences for children
aged 4 to 6 years; provided quality and affordable pre-school education through the MOE
Kindergartens; and shared curriculum resources and other good practices with the pre-school
sector (Ministry of Education, 2015b). Since 1999, the MOE has also improved pre-school
education by focusing on high leverage areas. These leverage areas include: delineating desired
outcomes for pre-school education; developing a curriculum framework; conducting research to
study the benefits of quality pre-school education; raising the standards of teacher training and
qualifications; and reviewing the regulatory framework of kindergartens (Ministry of Education,
2003).

The Singapore govenment plans to increase the MOE’s investment in pre-school

education over the next five years to S$290 million so as to continue to enhance the quality of
the pre-school sector (Singapore Government, 2011, 2012). To encourage pre-school providers
to further improve their standards and strive for greater excellence in pre-school education, the
Ministry of Education and Ministry of Social and Family have developed a voluntary quality
assurance and accreditation framework for implementation since January 2011. Based on the
framework, pre-school providers would be able to benchmark their education outcomes through
self-appraisal and external assessment. Pre-school providers that meet specified standards would
then apply to receive accreditation status (Ministry of Education, 2008b). And to support pre-
schools in their efforts, the MOE has also provided all pre-schools with curriculum resources,
such as a curriculum planning guide with sample lesson plans. The MOE and the Ministry of
Social and Family have also provided grants to non-profit pre-schools to purchase teaching and
learning resources such as books and educational software. All pre-school providers may also
apply for innovation grants to innovate and experiment so as to enhance their quality of teaching
and learning (Ministry of Education, 2008b).
Children in pre-school institutions would proceed to study in a primary school in
Singapore. Education is compulsory for all Singaporeans at the primary education level. This
means that all children above the age of six years must be enrolled in a national primary school
where they receive six years of schooling and sit for a terminal examination, Primary School
Leaving Examination (PSLE). Exceptions, however, are given to a child with special needs, a
child attending a designated school such as an Islamic religious school, and a child receiving
home-schooling (Ministry of Education, 2015a). For children with special needs, they may be
enrolled in one of the around 20 ‘Special Education’ (SPED) schools in Singapore. Students with
sensory impairment such as hearing- or visual-impairment who are able to access mainstream
curriculum would sit for the PSLE and, if successful, would continue their education in one of
the eight designated secondary schools for sensory impaired students who need specialised
support.Students with intellectual disability, on the other hand, would receive appropriate
vocational training at one of the training centres or worjshops to equip them with the necessary
skills for employment, where possible (Ministry of Education, 2015a).

Primary school students enrolled in national primary schools study core subjects such as
English language, Mother Tongue Language (Chinese, Malay or an approved Indian language),
Mathematics and Science. They are also encouraged to participate in Co-Curricular Activities
(CCAs) such as sports and music, and Community Involvement Programmes (CIP) where they
are involved in service learning projects (for more details on primary education, see Ministry of
Education, 2015a). Based on their performance in the PSLE, students will be placed in either the
Express, Normal (Academic) or Normal (Technical) stream in a secondary school. Depending on
the stream, they would receive four or five years of school and sit for a national examination:
General Certificate of Education ‘Ordinary’ Level (GCE ‘O’ Levels) for Express course) or
General Certificate of Education ‘Normal’ Level (GCE ‘N’ Levels) for Normal course.
Thereafter, depending on the interests and academic performance of the students, they may
proceed to pre-university education where they study in a two-year junior college or three-year
centralised institute course, and sit for the the General Certificate of Education Advanced Level
(GCE ‘A’ Level) examination. Other post-secondary options include being enrolled in a
vocational institution such as a polytechnic or the Institute of Technical Education (ITE), or
specialised arts institutions. In terms of university education, there are currently five publicly-
funded universities in Singapore and a number of private universities and institutions of higher
learning. The curent publicly-funded cohort participation rate (CPR) is 26% which translates into
more than one in four students from each Primary One cohort obtaining a place in one of
Singapore’s publicly-funded universities (Ministry of Education, 2015a).
In analysing the success of the educational system in Singapore, we can identify three salient
features in the current ability-driven education. The first feature is an educational system that
offers a variety of school types and programmes. The shift from an efficiency-driven to an
ability-driven paradigm witnesses a change from the previously unified, rigid and hierarchical
educational system. There are now schools that offer an Integrated Programme (IP) where
students bypass the GCE ‘O’ level exam and head straight for the GCE ‘A’ level exam or the
International Baccalaureate (IB) diploma. There are also specialised schools focusing on
nurturing students talented in sports, the arts, and science and mathematics. An accent is placed
on the holistic development of the students, rather than a fixation with academic performance
under an efficiency-driven education. For example, more weight is given to co-curricular
activities where traits like resilience, team spirit and resourcefulness are inculcated in the
students. Flexibility and autonomy will be given to school principals to admit more students
based on the criteria laid down by the schools. This may include both academic and non-
academic standards such as artistic or sporting talent. Related to this change is the shift from an
exam-oriented approach with a premium placed on languages, mathematics and science, to a
broader and more inclusive view of education.
Secondly, the curriculum has been revised to promote customised and inter-disciplinary
study, which is a departure from the former curriculum that was common, rigid and classified
under different subject-matter disciplines. The MOE has fundamentally reviewed its curriculum
and assessment system to better develop the thinking and learning skills required for the future.
Secondary students are given more choices to decide on their subject combination in schools,
and could even study new subjects such as Economics, Computer Studies and Drama. The post-
secondary curriculum is also revised to develop thinking skills and nurturing the spirit and values
required for Singaporeans to thrive in a more globalised, innovation driven future (Ministry of
Education, 2002; Ministry of Education, 2005a). The goal is to provide a broad-based education
where students are exposed to and be able to excel in different disciplines and ways of learning.
For example, a new subject is Knowledge and Inquiry (KI) which is a subject students in junior
colleges and pre-university centres (17-19 years old) can choose to take (Tan, 2006). It aims to
imbue students with a spirit of learning and exploration by developing the mental capacity to
question and seek answers to observations and phenomena (Ministry of Education, 2005b). It
adopts an inter-disciplinary approach to an investigation of the nature and construction of
knowledge, drawing from various disciplines such as the sciences, arts and humanities. The
students are expected to articulate and define their learning, and be responsible for their own
learning experiences, and KI teachers should create a learner-centred experience by acting as
facilitators, resource persons and models of learning.
The third feature concerns the shift in the role of the teacher under an ability-driven
education. Teachers are no longer just experts and dispensers of content knowledge; they are
expected to be resource persons to facilitate the students’ learning through creative and student-
centred activities. A significant policy initiative from the government is to encourage schools to
‘Teach Less, Learn More’ (TLLM). The aim is for teachers to teach better by engaging the
students and preparing them for life, rather than merely teaching more for tests and examinations
(Tharman, 2004). To support the implementation of TLLM, the MOE has reduced the content in
the curriculum so that teachers have more space to make learning more engaging and effective.
This also means that students will have less to study and more time to explore areas of learning
in which they are interested in. To further encourage teachers to break out of the old mode of
talk-and-chalk pedagogy, schools have set aside time-tabled time, known as ‘white space’ for
teachers to engage in professional planning, reflection and sharing. The MOE explained that
schools can use this space to customise and develop instructional content and materials, and use
effective pedagogy and authentic assessments that best suits their students (Ministry of
Education, 2005c). All these changes promise to enable and empower teachers to identify, adapt
and design appropriate pedagogy to nurture creative and critical thinkers in their students. In
terms of assessment, Singaporean teachers are urged to move beyond the focus on rote
memorisation of content knowledge and low-level thinking skills. The government values
students’ holistic development of competencies such as critical thinking, innovation and
creativity, communication, collaboration, independent learning, lifelong learning, information
and communication technology, and active citizenship. As such, alternative forms of assessment,
such as project work and Science Practical Assessment have been introduced as school-based
assessments into Singaporean classrooms at various key stages of schooling. At the secondary
school level, coursework is also recommended as a school-based assessment. Coursework marks
count toward the final grades in the examination of subject areas including Design and
Technology, Food and Nutrition, Art, and Music. A recent initiative known as C2015 has been
launched by MOE to focus on the development of students’ dispositions: a confidence
individual, a self-directed learner, an active citizen, and a concerned contributor (MOE, 2008a).
In the Primary Education Review and Implementation (PERI) recommendation (MOE, 2009),
the exams at primary 1 and 2 have been replaced with ‘bite-sized assessment’ or ‘topical tests’,
with an eye towards using assessment to support student learning. Likewise, the Secondary
Education Review and Implementation (SERI) recommendation emphasises the inculcation of
learning and life skills, values, character and citizenship, and socio-emotional competencies
among secondary school students (MOE, 2010).
Many of these soft skills involve processes and cannot be assessed by one-shot,
traditional standardised paper-and-pen tests; instead, formative, authentic and school-based
assessments have become viable alternatives (Koh, 2011, 2014; Koh & Luke, 2009).

Key Challenges for Education in Singapore

Despite the success of the educational system in Singapore, the state continues to face
some key educational challenges in an era of globalisation. Globalisation has brought about
major effects that include internationalisation, denationalisation of economies, weakening of the
nation state, and commodification of education (Ohmae 1995; OECD, 1996; Green, 1997, 2007;
Gopinathan, 2007). Policymakers have acknowledged that the ability of countries to compete in
the globalised knowledge economy is increasingly dependent upon their capacity to meet the
fast-growing demands for high-level skills. This in turn hinges on how the countries are making
significant progress in improving the quality of education of their people and providing equitable
learning opportunities for all (McKinsey Report, 2007).
This section highlights two main challenges facing education in Singapore against a
backdrop of globalisation. The first challenge is the management of increasing cultural diversity
in the educational landscape in Singapore. Globalisation means that Singapore has seen an
increasing inflow of foreign nationals into the country in search of better work opportunity, a
change of living environment and educational pursuits (National Population and Talent Division,
2008). As such, there are now greater changes in the demography of the Singapore society where
the demographic profile of the people in the general population is no longer characterised by a
Singaporean homogeneity or singular-culturalism. In other words, Singapore students are no
longer easily classified into Chinese, Malay, Indian or Others. Instead, we have new immigrants
such as those from China and India, as well as from others from a host of countries. A major
consideration for schools is the varied and potentially incompatible behaviours, attitudes and
values of the teachers and students across national and socio-cultural boundaries that may affect
school processes and educational outcomes. School leaders and teachers may be less inclined to
be culture-sensitive and may have tendencies towards ‘over-generalising’ students from certain
ethnic group or parochial classroom practices. As such, classroom management, teaching
pedagogies and other the related issues in diversity in schools would become challenging areas
of research and best practices for academics, and school leaders, respectively (Choy, 2011).
Responding to Singapore’s cultural diversity in the educational landscape, there is a need for
schools to adopt a multicultural approach in its organisational strategies, management structures
and practices in teaching and learning. Doing so would help schools to benefit from the wealth of
available knowledge, differing experiences, and global perspectives that students and
teachersfrom diverse backgrounds bring to the classroom. In fact, the differences in characters
and cultures may prove to be integral to school success, as diversity is considered important
towards enhancing innovation and enriching learning and teaching experiences for the students,
in an environment of school-based multiculturalism. Thus, this would signal a need for greater
sensitivity and empathetic orientations in schools, whereby there ought to be greater emphasis on
acceptance (and even perhaps, adaptability) beyond just tolerance for one another because of
existing differences. Classroom practices should ensure that there is continuous learning and
adaptation in schools (Choy, 2011).
The second challenge for education in Singapore is to enhance the professionalism of the
pre-school teachers so as to raise the teacher and education quality in the pre-school sector.
There are several pressing issues that the MOE needs to address for the pre-school education
sector. First, on the one hand, the educational profile of the population has shifted over the years
that results in many students having at least one parent who has post-secondary education. Thus,
parents are becoming more well-educated and have much higher expectations of the standard of
pre-school education for their children (MOE, 2008b). A better-educated population also means
that there is now a bigger pool of candidates with better qualifications who can become pre-
school teachers. On the other hand, there are lower and middle-income families who may not be
able to afford quality but expensive pre-school education for their children so pre-school
education should remain affordable for these families. Second, the pre-school education sector is
not attracting enough good teachers to join the service. Teaching professionals in the pre-school
education sector are still paid relatively less than similarly qualified people in the other sectors.
This problem is compounded by a third factor which is the insufficient training and continuing
career development, professional support and recognition for the pre-school teachers, which have
led to higher turnovers in the pre-schools (Oon, 2013). Given that the pre-school education is
crucial for giving the young children of Singapore a strong start in their early formative years, it
is important that effective policies are introduced to further enhancie the quality of the pre-school
education.

Conclusions
Singapore offers a good example of a young nation that has successfully transformed
itself from an impoverished and weak country into an economically and educationally advanced
country within 50 years. A large part of Singapore’s success was due to its emphasis on investing
in human capital and building a world-class education system. Education in Singapore is the
vehicle in nation-building by producing a competent, adaptive and productive workforce and
promoting social cohesion among the various ethnic groups. The long-term objective of
education in Singapore is to prepare students to meet the challenges of a knowledge economy
and to enhance the economic competitiveness of Singapore. It is noteworthy that the McKinsey
Report (2007) points out that high-performing school systems such as Singapore excel in
focusing on the following three fundamental success factors: effective mechanism for teacher
selection such that the right people are employed to become teachers (i.e., the quality of the
education system cannot exceed the quality of its teachers); effective processes for training and
development with strong emphasis on ensuring teachers are professionally developed to be
effective instructors (i.e., the best way to achieve excellent outcomes is to improve the
instruction); and effective systems and support structures are put in place to ensure that every
student will benefit from the excellent instruction (i.e., the best way for schools to achieve the
best performance is to raise the standard of every student). Looking ahead, it is expected that the
government of Singapore will continue to invest heavily in education so as to prepare its future
citizens to be active and successful contributors in a knowledge economy. Singapore exemplifies
the importance of adopting the best educational practices for achieving educational excellence in
school within the education system. It demonstrates that substantial improvement in school
outcomes is possible in a short period of time, and that adopting these best practices system-wide
can have significant impact in improving the school system. The case study on Singapore
illustrates that education policy makers and school leaders need to recognise that effective
implementation of system-level structures will affect the quality of practices of school leaders.
This would entail an in-depth examination of the components that are pertinent to the existing
structures so as to contribute to the success of the system (Senge, Cambron-McCabe, Lucas,
Smith, & Dutton, 2012).

Pendidikan di Singapura

Abstrak

Bab ini memperkenalkan sistem pendidikan di Singapura dengan mendiskusikan pendidikannya sejak
kemerdekaannya, sistem pendidikannya saat ini, fitur - fiturnya yang menonjol dantantangan utama yang dihadapinya di era
globalisasi. Bagian pertama menggambarkan tiga fasepengembangan pendidikan di Singapura: 'didorong oleh survival', 'didorong
oleh efisiensi', dan 'kemampuan-didorong '. Bagian kedua dari bab ini menjelaskan sistem pendidikan saat ini di Singapura,dari
pendidikan pra sekolah hingga pendidikan universitas. Ini juga menyoroti tiga fitur yang menonjol darisistem saat ini: sistem
pendidikan yang menawarkan berbagai jenis sekolah dan program, kurikulum yang mendorong studi yang disesuaikan dan antar-
disiplin, dan peranguru yang berubahmulai dari para ahli dan dispenser pengetahuan konten hingga narasumber untuk
memfasilitasibelajar siswa melalui kegiatan yang kreatif dan berpusat pada siswa. Bagian terakhir dari bab ini menyoroti dua
tantangan utama yang dihadapi Singapura di era globalisasi: untuk mengelolameningkatkan keanekaragaman budaya dalam
lanskap pendidikan di Singapura, dan untuk meningkatkanprofesionalisme guru pra sekolah sehingga dapat meningkatkan
kualitas guru dan pendidikan di sekolahsektor pra-sekolah.

Introduction
 Di antara sistem pendidikan Asia, Singapura menonjol karena prestasi akademiknya yang termasyhur dalam
penilaian internasional. Misalnya, siswa sekolah dasar dan menengah di Singapuratelah secara konsisten mengungguli siswa dari
negara lain dalam matematika dan sains di Indonesia. Kinerja akademik Singapura yang mengesankan dalam kurun waktu
singkat lima puluh tahun menandakan bahwa ia telah mencapai keberhasilan pendidikan, dengan dukungan sistem sekolah yang
efektif, sekolah yang dikelola dengan baik, guru yang berkualifikasi tinggi, dan siswa yang ulet. Oleh karena itu sangat penting
untuk memahami evolusi, faktor keberhasilan dan tantangan yang sedang berlangsung dari sistem pendidikan di Indonesia
Singapura. Bab ini memperkenalkan sistem pendidikan di Singapura dengan mendiskusikannya perkembangan pendidikan sejak
kemerdekaannya, sistem pendidikannya saat ini,yang menonjol fitur dan tantangan utama yang dihadapinya di era globalisasi

Sistem Pendidikan Saat Ini di Singapura

Bagian ini memberikan gambaran singkat tentang sistem pendidikan saat ini di Singapura. Mayoritas sekolah dari
tingkat dasar hingga pra-universitas adalah sekolah negeri (dikenal secara lokal sebagai Schools sekolah nasional ’) di bawah
Kementerian Pendidikan (MOE). Ini berarti bahwa sekolah-sekolah ini
dikendalikan secara administratif dan didanai oleh MOE. Sebelum ke sekolah dasar, anak-anak mungkin terdaftar di lembaga
pra-sekolah yaitu untuk anak usia 4 hingga 6 tahun. Orang tua dapat memilih untuk melakukannya mendaftarkan anak-anak
mereka di taman kanak-kanak swasta atau yang dikelola pemerintah. Anak-anak prasekolah di Singapura pada umumnya
mempelajari keterampilan dasar melek huruf dan berhitung serta bilingualisme: Bahasa Inggris bahasa pertama dan bahasa kedua
seperti Cina, Melayu dan Tamil.
MOE mengakui bahwa tahun-tahun awal sangat penting bagi holistik anak-anak
perkembangan, dan bahwa pendidikan pra-sekolah yang berkualitas akan memberikan anak-anak peluang untuk membangun
kepercayaan diri mereka, belajar keterampilan sosial dan mengembangkan disposisi belajar.

Oleh karena itu telah meningkatkan kualitas pendidikan TK dengan menerapkan hal berikut
langkah-langkah: mengembangkan sumber daya kurikulum untuk mendukung pendidik dalam merancang pembelajaran yang
berkualitas pengalaman untuk anak usia 4 hingga 6 tahun; memberikan pendidikan pra-sekolah yang berkualitas dan terjangkau
melalui MOE Kindergartens; dan berbagi sumber daya kurikulum dan praktik baik lainnya dengan sektor pra-sekolah
(Kementerian Pendidikan, 2015b). Sejak 1999, MOE juga meningkat pendidikan pra-sekolah dengan berfokus pada area dengan
leverage tinggi. Area leverage ini meliputi: menggambarkan hasil yang diinginkan untuk pendidikan pra-sekolah;
mengembangkan kerangka kerja kurikulum; melakukan penelitian untuk mempelajari manfaat pendidikan pra-sekolah yang
berkualitas; meningkatkan standar pelatihan dan kualifikasi guru; dan meninjau kerangka peraturan taman kanak-kanak

Dalam menganalisis keberhasilan sistem pendidikan di Singapura, kita dapat mengidentifikasi tiga fitur yang
menonjol dalam pendidikan berbasis kemampuan saat ini. Fitur pertama adalah sistem pendidikan yang menawarkan berbagai
jenis dan program sekolah. Pergeseran dari efisiensi ke efisiensi paradigma yang didorong oleh kemampuan menyaksikan
perubahan dari yang sebelumnya bersatu, kaku dan hierarkissistem pendidikan. Kedua, kurikulum telah direvisi untuk
mempromosikan program yang disesuaikan dan antar-disipli belajar, yang merupakan penyimpangan dari kurikulum sebelumnya
yang umum, kaku dan diklasifikasikan di bawah berbagai disiplin ilmu. Fitur ketiga menyangkut perubahan peran guru di bawah
kemampuan-didorong pendidikan. Guru tidak lagi hanya ahli dan dispenser pengetahuan konten; mereka diharapkan menjadi
narasumber untuk memfasilitasi pembelajaran siswa melalui kreatif dan siswa-
kegiatan terpusat.

Simpulan

Sebagian besar kesuksesan Singapura adalah karena penekanannya pada investasi modal manusia dan membangun sistem
pendidikan kelas dunia. Pendidikan di Singapura adalah kendaraan dalam pembangunan bangsa dengan menghasilkan tenaga
kerja yang kompeten, adaptif dan produktif dan mempromosikan kohesi sosial di antara berbagai kelompok etnis.
Analisis Komparatif Pendidikan
Sistem Amerika dan Jepang
Sekolah: Pandangan dan Visi

Erasmus pernah berkata, "Harapan utama suatu bangsa terletak pada pendidikan yang layak bagi masa mudanya."
Mengetahui dampak besar pendidikan terhadap suatu bangsa,Saya memutuskan untuk menyelidiki sistem pendidikan di Amerika
dan Jepang. DiMei 2006, saya dapat mengamati dan bekerja dengan siswa, pengajar, dan administrator Jepang melalui University
of Toledo's Study AbroadProgram. Tujuan dari penelitian ini adalah untuk menjawab bagaimana sistem pendidikan ataupraktik di
Jepang dan Amerika berbeda, dan bagaimana praktik Jepang mungkinmeningkatkan kualitas pendidik dan administrator
Amerika.
Selain banyak kesamaan, ada perbedaan yang mencolok di antara keduanya Pandangan Amerika dan Jepang dan visi
pendidikan, dan mereka menunjukkan ke arah dan jalur reformasi yang sangat berbeda di kedua negara.Sementara orang
Amerika sibuk membangun standar umum dan standar, mengembangkan dan menggunakan lebih banyak tes standar untuk semua
siswa, dan bergerak menuju reformasi sekolah berbasis standar, Jepang tampaknya menginginkan yang sebaliknya —
mendekonstruksi standar yang seragam, bergerak jauh dari tekanan ujian nasional, dan lebih fokus pada minat dan potensi
masing-masing siswa, tujuan yang sudah sering dilakukan diabaikan dalam budaya dan sekolah Jepang.
Pendidikan di Amerika Serikat

Pendidikan di Amerika Serikat disediakan terutama oleh pemerintah, dengan kontrol dan pendanaan yang berasal dari
tiga tingkat: federal, negara bagian, dan lokal. Di tingkat sekolah dasar dan menengah, kurikulum, pendanaan, pengajaran, dan
kebijakan lainnya ditetapkan melalui dewan sekolah yang dipilih secara lokal dengan yurisdiksi atas distrik sekolah. Distrik
sekolah bisa, tetapi ada tidak selalu, terkait dengan kabupaten atau kota. Standar pendidikan dan keputusan pengujian standar
dibuat oleh negara bagian melalui tindakan legislatif dan gubernur mereka, bersama dengan negara mereka berangkat
pendidikan.1 Sekolah adalah wajib untuk semua anak di Amerika Serikat. Paling anak-anak memulai pendidikan dasar dengan
taman kanak-kanak pada usia lima atau enam tahun,tergantung pada persyaratan kelayakan di distrik mereka, dan menyelesaikan
pendidikan menengah mereka pada usia delapan belas tahun atau ketika mereka senior tahun sekolah menengah berakhir.

Pendidikan di Jepang

Pendidikan di Jepang adalah tanggung jawab nasional, prefektur (provinsi),dan munici. Departemen Pendidikan,
Kebudayaan, Olahraga, Sains, dan Teknologi (dikenal sebagai Monbukagakusho, MEXT, sejak 2001) mengawasi puluhan
kelompok belajar internal yang mengevaluasi metode pendidikan dan memberikan panduan, saran, dan pendanaan kepada
pemerintah prefektur berdasarkan penelitian dari Dewan Nasional tentang Reformasi Pendidikan.
Tahun sekolah Jepang dimulai pada 1 April dan berakhir pada 31 Maret tahun berikutnya. Sekolah menggunakan sistem trimester
yang dipisahkan oleh jeda istirahat. Di masa lalu, anak-anak bersekolah lima hari penuh dan satu setengah hari pada hari Sabtu.
Namun, sejak tahun 2002, siswa telah bersekolah hanya lima hari seminggu, dan Sabtu adalah "hari bebas," dikenal sebagai
yutori kyoiku ("pendidikan tidak tergesa-gesa"), untuk mengejar akademik opsional atau kegiatan ekstrakurikuler.13 Banyak
guru melatih pada akhir pekan, dan mereka Kehadiran diperlukan selama liburan musim panas, biasanya bulan April Agustus.
sekolah memiliki minimum hukum 210 hari, tetapi sebagian besar lokal dewan sekolah menambahkan sekitar tiga puluh hari lagi
untuk festival sekolah, atletik bertemu, dan upacara dengan tujuan pendidikan nonakademik, terutama yang mendorong kerja
sama dan semangat sekolah. Dengan uang saku karena waktu yang dihabiskan untuk kegiatan semacam itu, jumlah hari yang
dikhususkan untuk instruksi hampir 195 per tahun.
Prestasi pendidikan terbesar Jepang adalah dasar berkualitas tinggi pendidikan yang diterima kebanyakan remaja pada
saat mereka menyelesaikan pendidikan tinggi sekolah. Statistik terkini menunjukkan bahwa lebih dari 95 persen orang Jepang
melek, yang sangat mengesankan karena Jepang adalah salah satu bahasa yang paling sulit untuk dibaca dan ditulis. Lebih dari 95
persen dari totalPenduduk Jepang lulus dari sekolah menengah. Beberapa spesialis pendidikan Jepang memperkirakan bahwa
rata-rata lulusan sekolah menengah atas Jepang telah memperoleh tingkat pendidikan yang sama dengan rata-rata orang Amerika
setelah dua tahun kuliah.15 Lebih dari 2,5 juta siswa melanjutkan ke universitas dan perguruan tinggi

Kesamaan
Fokus pada Pendidikan. Baik Amerika Serikat dan Jepang tetap ada berkomitmen kuat untuk pengejaran pendidikan.
Berkorelasi dengan pendidikan kelayakan sosial ekonomi dan politik, kedua negara mendanai akademik pencapaian secara bebas
dan menyediakan sumber daya tambahan. Jadi, nasional kesuksesan dikaitkan dengan kesuksesan individu. Struktur Pendidikan.
Secara organisasi, Amerika Serikat dan Amerika Serikat Jepang menangani pendidikan sebagai tanggung jawab bersama bangsa,
negara atau prefektur, dan daerah. Kedua negara memiliki agen federal pengawasan, mis., Departemen Pendidikan A.S. dan
MEXT (the Kementerian pendidikan Jepang). Kedua negara mempertahankan tanggung jawab negara bagian atau prefekturdalam
departemen pendidikan dan prefektur negara bagian dewan pendidikan, yang menyediakan panduan untuk distrik sekolah
individu (Amerika Serikat) dan dewan pendidikan kota (Jepang). Wajib belajar. Baik dalam sistem Jepang dan Amerika, sekolah,
baik negeri atau swasta, adalah wajib, dan bervariasi kedua negara. Di Amerika Serikat, sebagian besar anak-anak mulai
pendidikan dasar dengan taman kanak-kanak (usia lima atau enam) dan, tergantung pada kabupaten persyaratan, selesaikan
pendidikan mereka di tahun terakhir sekolah menengah atas(umur delapan belas)

Persyaratan Pendidikan. Meskipun keduanya Jepang dan Amerika Menyatakan mandat pendidikan wajib, sistem
ujian masuk Jepang memberikan pengaruh kuat di seluruh sistem. Siswa diharuskan untuk lulus ujian masuk yang keras untuk
memasuki sekolah menengah atas (kelas sepuluh hingga dua belas), yang mencakup hampir 94 persen dari mereka yang
menyelesaikan sekolah menengah pertama.Sekolah menengah atas lulusan harus lulus ujian masuk lain yang lebih sulit, dari yang
33 persen naik ke universitas empat tahun, junior college dua tahun, atau lembaga pascasarjana lainnya Persyaratan Kurikuler.
Meskipun Jepang dan Amerika Serikat memenuhi persyaratan kurikuler, kurikulum nasional Jepang memaparkan siswa ke
"pendidikan dasar dan seimbang" yang dikenal karena perlakuannya yang sama terhadap siswa.31 Amerika Serikat tidak
memiliki kurikulum nasional; sebagai gantinya, dewan pendidikan negara bagian menetapkan kurikulum di seluruh negara
bagian. Siswa melakukannya tidak berspesialisasi dalam bidang studi yang sempit sampai tahun kedua kuliah di yang paling awal

Kesimpulan

Sejumlah studi perbandingan telah berupaya menentukan caranya Sistem atau praktik pendidikan Jepang berbeda dari sistem
Amerika atau praktik, dan bagaimana sistem atau praktik pendidikan Jepang dapat meningkatkan kualitas pendidik dan
administrator Amerika. Di final analisis, bagaimanapun, satu karakteristik yang menarik dari pendidikan Jepang adalah prestasi
siswa.