Can the Internet help improve RI education?

The Jakarta Post , Jakarta | Thu, 02/22/2007 8:51 AM | Opinion

Elwin Tobing, Fullerton, California

Undoubtedly, the Internet has revolutionized the dissemination of information and knowledge. It enables people not only to transmit information in an instant but also to store and access massive amounts of information and data.

Today, with a relatively low subscription fee, almost all academic journals published in the world can be accessed via the Internet, not to mention the sites that provide free access to information, knowledge and data.

But does the Internet really promote the advancement of knowledge? Do people read more than before the Internet came into being? Long ago, when the television was invented, perhaps people asked the same question.

Studies have shown just the opposite. In the U.S. alone, where the ratio of television sets per 1,000 people is about 0.94 and where children aged 2-17 years old watch television for almost 25 hours per week on average, watching TV for more than three hours per day has contributed to a significant decline in children's reading ability. Studies also found children who watched more entertainment television watched fewer informative programs as they got older and used television more to entertain and as a leisure pastime.

Neil Postman in Amusing Ourselves to Death wrote: ""...television's conversations promote incoherence and triviality; that the phrase 'serious television' is a contradiction in terms; and that television speaks in only one persistent voice -- the voice of entertainment.""

There is an interaction between society and its technologies. Society creates technology, and the development of society, to a large extent, is brought about by technology. This sparks a question, will information technology improve the advancement of knowledge in our society? Unfortunately, the presence of the Internet might help degrade, instead of improve, the quality of our education. This is due to at least two reasons:

First, the free information and knowledge on the Internet poses a negative consequence. In a country where the commitment to respect and protect copyrights is still loose, the Internet could worsen the learning process. It could trigger plagiarism among students, teachers and professors, which virtually adds nothing to the existing knowledge. Even in developed countries, where copyrights are protected, the negative impacts of the Internet on the advancement of knowledge are no less serious.

According to a recent study conducted by turitin.com, a web database dedicated to detecting plagiarism, about 30 percent of a large sample of Berkeley students were identified as plagiarizing directly from the Internet. Tests, Schechter and Eder reported in 2002 that by some estimates there are 3,000 more sites that provide materials for students than there are sites to authenticate student work. Given the loose protection of copyrights, the percentage of our students who commit plagiarism could be well above the case in Berkeley.

So, when people are using the Internet more extensively to get information, they are not necessarily thinking more systematically and creatively. Paradoxically, we may be living in an information society, but we are not necessarily becoming a thinking and learning society.

Second, the transition from printing to virtual knowledge remains problematic. Before the Internet was invented, people in developed countries were already living in a reading and printing culture. In the U.S., for instance, thousands of new books are published every year. There are numerous libraries with massive stocks of books. From elementary school, students are already taught to write essays and give speeches in front of their peers. It is an expressive society in which expressing their thoughts -- either verbally or written -- is an important part of the learning process.

Ours is not a reading society -- yet. Reading books has not been a main interest in our society, let alone writing them. Even professors and teachers at universities and colleges have limited skills in writing. The number of books published per year is very low. Our libraries are too few and their stocks of books are also very limited. To make matter worse, our culture is not an expressive culture and our education does not really encourage students to write and express their thoughts systematically.

When developed countries move from a printing knowledge to a virtual knowledge, there is only a little shock. Most of the information stored virtually on the Internet has already been available in print. That is not the case with our country. When we are presented with virtual knowledge, we experience a significant shock. Suddenly, students or Internet users are overloaded with information and because of its suddenness and its massiveness they become lost in a desert of information.

Whether the Internet can improve the advancement of the learning process in Indonesia depends on whether we can move into printing and virtual knowledge at the same time. Reading books stimulates and demands thoughts.

Therefore, the challenge is whether we can promote a learning and reading culture. The publication of original thoughts or creative thinking should be supported, promoted and appreciated. Public libraries with reasonable stocks of books should be built in medium and large-size cities. Above all, our formal education has to be able to stimulate students, from elementary to university level, to arrange their thought and ideas systematically.

At the same time, we have to build and maintain our commitment to respect copyrights. Plagiarism not only impedes critical thinking, but also discourages further creative explorations of knowledge. This is the hardest part because no matter what punishment is, plagiarism will always exist. At best, we can minimize it by simultaneously punishing plagiarists severely while giving appreciation for original or creative thoughts.

The writer, who holds a Ph.D., teaches at the Department of Economics, California State University, Fullerton, U.S.

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