Many brilliant Indonesian students, mostly winning international Science Olympiads, prefer to study in Singapore as our government offers them less attractive facilities. What do you think?
Your comments: I believe that good seeds grow best in good soil. It is a waste (even a crime) to plant good seeds in bad soil when we know good soil is available somewhere else.
However, it would not be right to stop the good seeds leaving this bad soil; the correct way is to prepare our own soil to be as good as the others.
Even if that is the case, it is still not wise to stop the free movement of physical as well as nonphysical (knowledge, information, etc) entities.
It is one's personal right to choose and others just have to respect that choice.
Arsene Wenger
I am a scientist and have lived in Indonesia for 12 years. I found students who later became scientists were on a par (I am modest, actually some were better!) with their international counterparts. What are required are the right opportunities and facilities.
Akhilesh Pandey
New Delhi
Developed countries, including Singapore, realize the influence brilliant students can have on their countries.
They realize it is important to invite them to live there and develop their research. They are able to pay more because they know they will get more.
Anang
Entertainers just sing songs and they get high rewards. Brilliant students think, analyze, observe, supervise and create stuff, yet they just get a song titled "Thanks".
How can this be?
Ferdi Syah Humzha
Isn't this the same question as to why young men and women from remote provinces come to universities in Jakarta (and stay in Jakarta for their careers)?
But look at the bright side: Sri Mulyani also did her master's and PhD abroad (Illinois, USA). And she came back, didn't she? And looked what she is now contributing to the country!
Let all those brilliant students go to MIT, Stanford or whatever. Each will, when the time comes, contribute to Indonesia in their own way. And, I assure you, each of their contributions will be meaningful.
Prim D
Money is the important thing. I think everybody has to make choices for their own future because the government does not give any guarantees.
Indonesia is a big country which is different to Singapore, a small but rich country. Perhaps it would be better if the government cooperates with the private sector to get sponsorship as a short-term solution. We can then make plans on how to build this country with the help of these bright students; maybe we should prepare a kind of institution that can handle it. For the moment, let's not talk about nationalism.
Anton
Even sadder is the fact that the smartest of these students will probably stay abroad once educated, as the job prospects for them at home are so dire.
Salaries at even the best government universities in Indonesia are appallingly bad.
I know one former academic with a PhD, educated overseas, who gave up a lecturing job at one of our top universities to be a schoolteacher at a private school in Jakarta, because the salary was double what he was getting at university.
I know another who lectures at a Malaysian university for much the same reason.
David
Jakarta
