City to review admission fees of schools with RSBI label

The Jakarta Education Agency is planning to set minimum admission fees for international standard pilot-project schools (RSBI), to protect parents from overpaying tuition fees for non-competitive schools bearing such claims.

Agency head Taufik Yudi said his office would conduct an evaluation of schools’ performances after the new students’ enrollment process finished.

“We will evaluate the schools’ financial management, [student] recruitment and academic achievement of RSBI schools,” he said. Taufik said the agency would also compare the evaluation result of the RSBI schools with those of regular state schools to see whether the former could yield students with better achievements by imposing more expensive tuition fees on parents.

The quality of state schools in the country are categorized into international standard schools (SBI), RSBI, national standard schools (SSN), model schools and regular schools. RSBI refers to state schools that are in the process of becoming SBIs. SSN refers to state schools that have qualified teachers, complete school facilities and have a good academic achievement record.

Regular schools refer to state schools with modest human resources and facilities, while model schools are those in the process of becoming SSN schools.

The National Education Ministry is authorized to give an RSBI or SBI status as well as degrading the status to a school after evaluating it. There are 12 high schools, four vocational schools, six junior high schools and five elementary schools that have RSBI status in Jakarta. As of today, there has been no school with an SBI label in the city.

In June, legislators at the House of Representatives called on the government to issue a regulation on the imposition of admission fees on parents by schools with SBI and RSBI labels.

They warned the regulation was badly needed to prevent corruption since many of the schools imposed different entrance fees with no standardized quality. The ministry later ordered local administrations to set standards and monitor the quality of the schools.

“We will also see problems in the language. If teachers in a school still cannot master English, then it should not push itself to be an RSBI school,” said Taufik, adding the use of English in the learning process was a requirement in RSBI.

Governor Fauzi Bowo said RSBI school management should be transparent in explaining the equirements of entering the schools to parents who wanted to send their children to the schools. “If parents are not informed before [enrolling their children], it means they are set up,” he said. Earlier, Jakarta City Council’s Commission E overseeing education and welfare affairs announced its plan to set up a taskforce to investigate the imposition of high entrance fees by RSBI schools.

“When will students from low-income families get quality education if good facilities are only enjoyed by the rich?” Firmansyah of the Democratic Party said. He added labeling the schools, which allowed them to charge additional fees, triggered competition among schools that wanted to increase their standing for monetary gain.

Education experts and activists criticized the school labeling set by selected state schools, saying the system reduced opportunities because schools with the RSBI label were allowed to set higher school admission and fees.